Spaulding Roundup: Akeem Watch, Princely Followup & Other UCLA Football Notes

by Nestor on Apr 30, 2010 5:14 AM PDT in Football

Photo Credit: Telemachus

We have a bunch of football notes to share this Friday before Ryan and co. gets the baseball party going at BN. Let's start with Akeem Ayers, who was put on the Lombardi watch list Thursday. This wasn't a surprise because Ayers will probably find himself on all kinds of awards watch list and All American lists heading into this season. In addition to his solid play (second on the team in both sacks (6.0) and tackles for loss (14.5)) it was his freakish Sports Center highlight plays (3 TDs) that has him on everyone's radar this off-season.

The key for Ayers will be to block all of this attention and stay focused this off-season. Ayers really came along towards the second half of the season when Chuck Bullough started using him in a hybrid DE/LB role (essentially turning UCLA into a 3-4 defense) lining him up all over the field. Hopefully that trend will continue (without making our defense too predictable) from the very first game in 2010 season.

Speaking of off-season workouts ESPN's Blair Angulo posted an extensive followup-writeup on Kevin Prince after our spring game. Angulo's article put Prince's spring game in context but the nugget I found interesting was Prince self-organizing off-season workouts during this winter:

Maybe it's because Prince didn't waste much time assuming control of the team after it returned from its EagleBank Bowl victory in December. He organized a weekly throwing schedule with his receivers three or four times a week at Spaulding Field.

"It's all about getting that timing down," receiver Taylor Embree said. "You look at the NFL and the greatest quarterbacks -- Peyton Manning and Tom Brady -- it's all timing. This is a rhythm game. Once you get that trust and that rhythm down, there's no stopping it -- especially with someone as skilled as Prince."

By all means, Prince is not a finished product. Neuheisel would like to see an improvement in Prince's accuracy. Chow would like to see more growth and development. For Prince, it's all about leadership.

"Coach Chow wants us to take control," Prince said. "He wants us to push him to the side and say, 'We've got this.'"

Hope Prince continues to exercise that kind of leadership through rest of this off-season. More after the jump.

Now that the good news is out of the way here is the news of setback from Randall Caroll and Sheldon Price. From the track team notes:

Sprinters Randall Carroll and Sheldon Price are academically ineligible for the spring quarter. They will not compete in any meets during this quarter.

This also means Carroll and Price are not going to be elgibile to participate in this weekend's track meet against Southern Cal. The news doesn't surprise me all that much though. Again both of those kids are freshmen. The workload pressure on a UCLA freshmen who is trying to balance football practice, track meets and most likely 12-16 units of courses are a little ridiculous. I have seen lot of class valedictorians struggle over the years in their first year in Westwood with full workload of classes, work and extra-curricular activities. So I am not surprised this happening to Carroll and Price.

I kind of wish they weren't doing track in their first year and waited till their second or third year to get acclimated to the rhythm of UCLA's quarter system. Let's hope those guys take care of business this quarter to get ready for Fall. Suffice to say they are not going find someone like Senora Ross in Westwood.

Speaking of Senora Ross, let's end with a link to a dumb column by Dennis Dodd from CBSSportsline.com. Dodd wrote up a silly article comparing Hello Kiffin and Rick Neuheisel. He tries to make the argument that Kiffin is the same "coach" Rick Neuheisel was when he took over Bill McCartney's program in Colorado. Dodd just happened to leave out a very important fact while making the comparison. Neuheisel actually won on his own in Colorado and in Washington putting together seasons featuring double digit victories and accumulating a .688 career winning percentage before taking over at Westwood. Kiffin in comparison still hasn't cracked the .400 mark. So whatever.

Kiffin and his PR chronies at Southern Cal are on a full campaign mode to paint him as some kind of tough guy who is out to impose discipline lost during the Pom Pom era. LOL. They can put as much lipstick on their pig as they want but are not going to be able to get away from superficial and sleazy track record compiled by who by all account is the Paris Hilton of college football.

GO BRUINS.

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Comments

Lame

as the new “Sheriff” and “laying down the law”? LMAO!!!

My favorite thing I heard an analyst say about his was “He was born on 3rd base and acts like he hit a triple” HA HA!

"The entire world that bleeds blue and gold ... they have been dying for this." - Coach Rick Neuheisel

by uclafan11 on Apr 30, 2010 7:19 AM PDT reply actions

oops

about “him”

"The entire world that bleeds blue and gold ... they have been dying for this." - Coach Rick Neuheisel

by uclafan11 on Apr 30, 2010 7:19 AM PDT up reply actions

IIRC it was Pat Forde who made that comment

by Nestor on Apr 30, 2010 7:24 AM PDT up reply actions

Laying down the law =

Jersey # police!

by 99von on Apr 30, 2010 7:35 AM PDT up reply actions

That's very cool that Prince and company are taking the initiative to workout on their own.

Hope he and the other QBs have had a chance to pick T Brady’s mind when he has spent time in Westwood.

The best thing you can do for your children is to love their mother. John Wooden

by MexiBruin on Apr 30, 2010 7:43 AM PDT reply actions

Akeem Ayers, Academics

I hope he does stay focused cause he could be primed for a big year. Hopefully he is going to be able to handle being ‘the’ man on defense this year. Cause last the O had to worry about putting multiple hats on BP, and the Boz’s prolly also took some attention off of him. This is year is going to be real measuring stick for him as far as his draft stock is concerned. Would love to see him stay for his senior year as seeing him on the field with a more developed josh shirley might make a freakishly athletic SLB and WLB combo.

Ive never really had much sympathy for those who are academically ineligible… Nestors probably right about the fact that they shouldn’t be participating in track in their freshmen year but still, freshmen course work is not the most challenging stuff… The fact still remains that they are STUDENT/athletes, not athlete/students. Hopefully they can take care of this before the summer session.

by MaltBaa on Apr 30, 2010 8:10 AM PDT reply actions

Speaking of lipstick on a pig

You can still vote for for Kitten’s purty puss here.

by Gen2Bruin1987 on Apr 30, 2010 9:03 AM PDT reply actions

I think our Defense will be better overall

I know it seems like WTF are you talking about? but we’ll have a lot more size and speed overall on defense. especially in our LB and Secondary. our line is faster and stronger overall, no one will be Price ,but if they come together like they should our defense will play as one solid unit, rather than having only 3-4 guys make plays consistantly. I really like where our team is headed, they need to have another great offseason this summer.

G.Granillo- Bruin for life!!!!
"If you're not making mistakes, then you're not doing anything. I'm positive that a doer makes mistakes." - John Wooden

by g.granillo on Apr 30, 2010 10:18 AM PDT reply actions

Randall Carroll and Sheldon Price

I suppose I’m not as forgiving as most when it comes to academics. Being completely honest, I’m disappointed in the guys. Sure, timing-wise their ineligibility doesn’t hurt our football team too much, which is nice. But at the same time, I don’t really give that much slack to any athlete that doesn’t pass the bare minimum requirements. If they’re having a lot of trouble in the classroom, they have a lot of support from coaches, tutors, and teammates to turn things around.

Then again, if they were both taking upper-division applied mathematics courses with ATV as 18-year-olds, I could understand. But knowing that the vast majority of the freshman on the team utilize the resources around them to take care of business in the classroom, even with a demanding athletic schedule, I just can’t cut these two any slack.

I really hope they take this as a learning experience (no pun intended), and ensure that it doesn’t happen again. Even though it’s not a revenue-sport like football, they’ve let down their track team. I feel bad for the track coaches that were counting on them. C’mon Randall Carroll and Sheldon Price, pick it up! We all know you can!

by MWbruin on Apr 30, 2010 11:45 AM PDT reply actions