Firing back
Toledo's Bruins top Aggies
1/2/1998
For the second time in his life, UCLA coach Bob Toledo escaped the long shadow of Texas A&M's defense. This time, he didn't have to lose his job to do it.
Weathering a knockout swing from the Aggies' defense, fifth-ranked UCLA won the Southwestern Bell Cotton Bowl, 29-23, on Thursday to complete a three-game sweep of Texas schools and give Toledo a cherished first-time bowl victory over the coach who fired him four years ago.
Only 59,215 tickets were sold for the game. The actual crowd was estimated at 45,000, well below the Cotton Bowl's 68,252 capacity.
"It was a little nostalgic to see A&M's defense play like that," Toledo said. "But I've been around these gold helmets for a while now. I had all the confidence in the world that we would win the game."
A&M coach R.C. Slocum fired Toledo as his offensive coordinator following the Aggies' 24-21 loss to Notre Dame in the 1994 Cotton Bowl. A major point of contention was the failure of A&M's offense to match the Aggie defense's reputation for dominating games.
"I'm extremely disappointed that we didn't win," an ashen-faced Slocum said. "That's what we came here for."
Toledo's UCLA squad caught the full force of A&M's best defensive effort of the year. The 20th-ranked Aggies raced to a 16-0 lead with the first nine points supplied directly by the defense.
An interception by A&M linebacker Dat Nguyen and lateral to teammate Brandon Jennings in the first quarter resulted in an 83-yard run back that produced the game's first points. Early in the second quarter, A&M defensive end Zerick Rollins sacked UCLA quarterback Cade McNown for a safety.
That proved to be high tide for A&M's blitz-crazed defense.
McNown rallied the Bruins with two touchdown passes and a 20-yard touchdown run. Then, with A&M clinging to a 23-21 lead in the fourth quarter, McNown engineered a game-winning 71-yard drive. A&M's defense, forced to carry the load for an ineffective offense, finally succumbed to the pounding feet of UCLA tailback Skip Hicks of Burkburnett, who rushed for 140 yards on 31 carries.
With 7:05 to play, a five-yard touchdown run by Ryan Neufeld on a tight end-around play gave the Bruins their first lead. UCLA's defense made it stand with a late assault on A&M quarterback Randy McCown, a second-half replacement for injured Aggies starter Branndon Stewart.
McNown was named the game's outstanding offensive player by one vote over Hicks. Nguyen, who made 20 tackles, was named the outstanding defensive player.
After the game, Hicks and several other UCLA players donned T-shirts proclaiming the Bruins as "Texas State Champs." UCLA (10-2) closed the season with a school-record 10-game winning streak. Among UCLA's victories were a 66-3 wipeout of Texas and a 66-10 victory over Houston.
"We would have had a lot of dust cloths," Toledo said, "if we hadn't gotten that game won."
UCLA's comeback from a 16-0 deficit was the second-biggest in Cotton Bowl history. It fell six points short of Notre Dame's 22-point comeback in a 35-34 victory over Houston in 1979.
The Aggies (9-4) became the first team to suffer four straight Cotton Bowl losses. But for the first 29 minutes, a major upset seemed in the works.
McNown, sacked five times in the first half, was victimized for one of the stranger plays in Cotton Bowl history. Late in the first quarter, Nguyen intercepted McNown's attempt at a middle screen at the A&M 17. He ran 19 yards the other way before lateraling to Jennings, who scored.
Rollins, who had not recorded a sack this season, nailed McNown in UCLA's end zone less than five minutes into the second quarter.
McNown's only early highlight was a 76-yard quick kick. The Aggies nullified that with one of their few offensive highlights - a 74-yard scoring blast by Dante Hall that lifted A&M to a 16-0 lead with 5:54 left in the first half.
With just 45 seconds left in the half, UCLA finally got untracked. A 33-yard punt return by Eric Scott launched a quick 47-yard march. McNown capped it with just two seconds left with a 22-yard scoring pass to Jim McElroy.
Barely two minutes into the second half, McNown found Hicks for a 41-yard scoring strike. With Stewart forced from the game with a strained Achilles' tendon, the Aggies used a 43-yard end-around run by Chris Cole to regain a nine-point lead.
McNown answered with a 20-yard touchdown run late in the third quarter that capped a 65-yard drive. After Neufeld's go-ahead score, McNown added a two-point run on an option keeper.
McNown completed 16 of 29 passes for 239 yards. The Aggies generated only 247 total yards and gained only 55 yards on seven completions.
"You can't win big ball games with the kind of offense we had," Slocum said.
For Bob Toledo, that refrain doesn't carry the pain it once did.
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