Now it is time to say good night to all our Volunteers..

The Rick Neuheisel era began tonight with the biggest upset in recent history by any team in this city. Sure those dastardly Trojans win all of the time but when was the last time they beat someone they were not supposed to beat. Oh, yeah, they were the team that got upset.

Technically, the USC loss to Stanford was the largest upset in college football last year. It was a huge upset. USC was a 27 point favorite and lost AT HOME! So what UCLA did tonight will in no way overshadow the Cardinal upset of the Trojans last year at the Coliseum? Trojan Fan, we hold your “upsetedness” in legendary status. At the Yard, we still take a quiet moment with 49 seconds left in the work day and remember Mark Bradford’s 10 yard touchdown pass from Stanford Quarterback Tavita Pritchard on October 6, 2007. Trojans, you are to be commended for losing so convincingly as to ruin 92,000 people’s and your own year in sixty seconds of missteps and miscues of an otherwise convincing USC victory that ended in a tragic USC defeat.

No UCLA’s win tonight was not as big an upset as that game last year but it was epic. Now my fan base has called me on using “epic” too frequently and I did try to work that sentence without it but tonight was epic. The Tennessee fans are large and they travel as such. They were well represented and never expected for 60 minutes and overtime that they would lose to the powder blue flakes from West LA. And trust me, this powder blue flake from West LA never thought the Bruins were going to win either.

But this is really not the Rick Nueheisel era, it is the Norm Chow Vindication World Tour. Norm and the Peter did not part on good terms several years back. Norm never thought Pete Carroll gave him the credit he deserved when first he coaxed a shell shocked Carson Palmer and then a flighty Matt Leinhart to back to back Heisman Trophies. Neither quarterback has done as well in the pros as they did at USC nor has either had a QB coach like Norm Chow since they graduated. Pete got the keys to the City of the Angels because Norm Chow’s offense outscored teams while the Peter could recruit the defense he wanted. Norm was the genius, Pete was the face.

Tonight, Norm Chow coaxed a 3rd string JuCo transfer QB to THE upset of the first weekend of the college football season. Kevin Craft threw four interceptions in the first half and the Bruins were under water against a vaunted SEC powerhouse in Tennessee. Whatever Norm and Rick said at halftime, worked and Craft rallied the Powder Blue Flakemeisters to an epic, yes epic upset. Norm Chow was in Kevin’s head all summer. He did not coach him to that first 30 minutes of misery. Chow pushed him to the last thirty minutes of redemption.

The Bruins were down the entire game to a better team and scrapped out the victory with kids who attend UCLA so they can do more with their lives than play football. Tonight, they nutted up against SEC players that hope football is their life calling. At the Yard, we understand and appreciate scrappy, nuts and we answer all calls. If you are UCLA fan, it is our mission and our lineage.

Pete, you should worry about Norm. He knows your defense because he prepared for it every practice for four years. He was the genius that made you a king. You never understood his offensive genius and humbly pretend it never occurred. He might be preparing for Fresno State but he is thinking about how to f--- you up and you know it. You can smile and say all the right things but you never thought Norman the C. would ever return to LA and certainly not at UCLA. UCLA has a tough schedule and will lose some games. USC might not and should be in a position to earn another BCS Championship bid. Funny things can happen at the Rose Bowl in December. December 6, 2008 might be a date we all want to circle on the calendar now.