Despite having an extra week to prepare, the UCLA football team was thoroughly outplayed Saturday in a 42-13 loss to visiting Indiana that served as a rude introduction to the Big Ten.
The grades released from PFF the morning after only serve as confirmation to some of the Bruins’ more obvious issues.
Here’s a look at how the Bruins fared individually (all grades shown are for players who appeared in at least 15 snaps):
Offensive line remains work in progress
UCLA is still looking for better collective results in both run- and pass-blocking, only this time its two transfer additions proved to be the lowest-graded starters as the Bruins had breakdowns on both the left and right sides of the line.
The run game, in particular, got off to another slow start averaging just 2.0 yards in its first 26 carries of the contest. Afterward, head coach DeShaun Foster said the results were different from what he saw in practices throughout the week.
“I know it’s going to get repetitive, you guys are going to keep hearing it, but we’re just not executing,” Foster said of the issues running the ball through two games. “You know, I would want to say some other things up here and try to tell you guys something else but I’d be lying, but we’re just not executing. If we’re seeing this at practice it would be easy to go, but we’re executing in practice but it’s just not carrying over to the game, so we’ve just got to figure out a better way to get it done.“
UNLV transfer right guard Alani Makihele had the toughest time in pass-protection and he was the lone starter on the five-man unit to not play all 56 snaps. Reserve redshirt freshman Tavake Tuikolovatu came in to handle 15 snaps.
