Not a moral victory, but not a terrible loss either

UCLA lost to Fresno State. That was no surprise.

But UCLA put up 31 points. Considering how bad the Bruin offense looked against BYU and Arizona, that was a huge surprise. 

There is no such thing is a moral victory. A loss is a loss, and I’m disappointed that the Bruins lost. But I’m not nearly as down as I was after the BYU and Arizona games. I have hope now that this team might not be that bad the rest of the season and could win a few games. I didn’t have that hope before today.

It was the defense that blew the game, giving up 36 points and completely unable to stop Fresno State when it counted the most on the final never-ending drive. But that’s not a reason to be concerned yet. Usually, it’s UCLA’s good defense that bails out its bad offense, or at least keeps the game close. This is the first time I can think in recent years that it was the other way around, and the defense has a lot of young players. If they’re still this bad by the end of the season, there’s a problem, but one rare bad game when the offense does well will happen once in a while. It does to other teams at least.

UCLA plays Washington State next week, and I’m actually confident the Bruins can win. How about that for a change?