Bruin Bites: No Shell Game for UCLA, Walker is Out, But the Rose Bowl is Open

PHEW. Well I am still catching my breath from tonight's baseball game thanks to the usual "routine" of Mr. David Berg (Ryan has the glorious recap from game 1 v. MSU here). While I am sure everyone here is geeked up for tomorrow night's game I wanted to take note of some important football related notes on the home page (which has already been shared in the fanshots). So let's have a quick football edition of Bruin Bites to start the early day (at least out in the East Coast) here on BN:

• So the much ballyhooed Pitt running back transfer Rushel Shell is not going to transfer to UCLA after all (fanshotted by Bruins#1). Although it looks like Pitt is not really all that interested in taking him back. The official reason given is that he wants to be closer to his two twin daughters. Nothing can be more important than taking care of family and if they are the reasons - let's hope everything works out for the guy. We have heard some chatter about other reasons why his transfer to UCLA didn't work out but we are not going to worry too much about them. Either way thankfully for us it appears Craig Lee will be part of the team next season so our running back depth is still in pretty good shape. While I am not completely surprised that Shell will not end up on UCLA, I suppose we can't blame the coaches too much for taking a chance and offering him a scholarship - as it was a good calculated gamble on their part.
• If you haven't heard the news - (rising) sophomore WR Kenny Walker is going to miss next season due to a back surgery. This news is a bummer because I was really looking forward to see Walker's development into his second season in Westwood after he displayed some flashes of his talent and speed in his first year. Luckily for us we do have a bit of depth at WR now with Shaquelle Evans, Jordan Payton, Devin Lucien and Devin Fuller (this probably cements him in the receivers rotation). Plus we will have Eldridge Massington who enrolled in school early to get ready for next season. So we could be all right but it's still a bummer to have Walker out after a fairly promising start to his UCLA career in Westwood. Hopefully he has a full recovery and come back stronger as a redshirt sophomore in 2014.
• If you are having serious football withdrawals and are itching to get back to the Rose Bowl this summer - no worries. The Rose Bowl is now open for public tours. Jack Wang posted all the details on Inside UCLA.
• We may have gotten an unplanned sneak preview of our new unis courtesy of incoming freshman Caleb Benenoch. We will have more detailed commentary on this development later on Tuesday.

I will close out with a baseball related note. We all know college football is king when it comes to college sports. Yet here we are in - in the offseason - and we have almost 700 comments in a thread tracking our Bruins in the championship series of the CWS.

Almost 700 comments in a thread towards the end of June. Just imagine what this place could look like if UCLA was playing with something similar at stake in a BCS Bowl game.

GO BRUINS.