TGIF! I always thought that meant Thank God I'm Fabulous. Guess I was wrong, but you should still enjoy your Friday! It's a busy one for the Pac-12 as the football coaches appear on Media Day to get people excited about their programs. We've got the full coverage from the last few days including Coach Mora's various media appearances, and we've got an open thread here so keep up to date and share your thoughts!
Meanwhile, a variety of news came out this week that are pretty interesting:
- Sticking with football, this should shock no one: ESPN prefers Southern Cal. It's not even a bias they try to hide. ESPN Audio just released its schedule and Chris Foster reports that Southern Cal will make seven appearances and UCLA only one, with that one being the game against the Trogans. Chris, thanks for pointing this out...but ESPN is the flagship radio for the Trogans (at least in LA). Not sure if Foster is trying to stir the pot or if I'm missing something...what the hell is ESPN Audio anyway?!
- On another football note, Pacific Takes looks at the Bruins' five-star recruits of the last 11 years. UCLA has had 10 such recruits, which PT considers "a lot". It is an interesting list though. Looking at how they panned out, 4 were/are stars, 5 are TBD and one (Morrell Presley) was a bust. Yes, we currently have six 5-star players on our roster. That's not too shabby, let's keep it going!
- It looks like King Ed's lawsuit is grabbing a lot of attention and a lot of support. The latest nod comes from Maryland football coach Randy Edsall, who took a stand for student athletes. This thing is getting bigger every day, it sets up to be a monumental decision that could have huge implications for the NCAA.
- Speaking of the NCAA, here is another example of their ridiculous methods, with UNC's PJ Hairston in their crosshairs. It's pretty infuriating how they latch on to all these minor violations (and I bring this up because of Shabazz's backpack) and completely overlook huge ones -cough cough Calipari cough cough. I can seriously see this institution slowly withering away or have a serious makeover. Then again, UCLA probably dodged a bullet with Shabazz because one certain boyfriend couldn't keep his mouth shut.
- For all the soccer fans out there, and I know there are quite a few of us, looks like perennial powerhouse Real Madrid will once again train at UCLA. It's so much fun to watch these guys play...and so depressing if you've ever played to see how far you ever were from being this good.
- Another UCLA alum gives back to his alma mater. This time, it is Hong Kong businessman William Mong who made a big $5 million gift to the Samueli School of Engineering. That is fantastic and it is the single largest gift from Asia to UCLA, which probably has Gene Block doing this. Nonetheless, our awesome engineering school certainly deserves it.
- Finally, yet another college ranking comes out, this time from Forbes. UCLA checks in at #34 but frankly this ranking is somewhat ridiculous because it lumps in tiny 1500-student colleges with big universities. So a tiny school like Pomona gets ranked #2...ok then. Stanford took top billing, and as I'm sure most of you are curious, Southern Cal (aka Figueroa Tech) came in at #63. Though they should probably be lumped in with these guys.
That's it folks, enjoy your Friday and your weekend!
Go Bruins!