California: Flashback to UCLA vs. Cal 2002

By: Guest Blogger Barry from TedfordIsGod.com

One of the most enjoyable football games I have ever experienced in real life ended with my left foot being crushed by a 300-pound lineman.

Let me explain.

My freshman year at Cal began in the fall of 2002, and at that time I hated UCLA more than I hated pretty much anything else in the universe. If you had given me the option of either A) saying something nice about the school/students/faculty/football program, B) shooting myself in the face or C) locking myself in a Dykstra Hall triple for the rest of eternity, I probably would have had to go with Secret Option D, which entailed an economy-sized box of Tylenol PM and a private hospital bed.

Seriously, I hated the 2002 Bruins more than I had ever hated another sports team in my life up to that point. So when the Bears defeated the Bruins that season in the most bizarre fashion possible, I couldn’t have been happier if the university had suddenly announced it was adding a class entitled “Eating 17 Bowls of Cap’n Crunch Per Day 101” to the graduation requirements.

On fourth down with two seconds left in the game and Cal leading 17-10, QB Kyle Boller threw a pass 40 yards directly backwards into his own end zone, where WR Jonathan Makonnen was waiting. Makonnen waited for the seconds to tick off the clock, then strolled out of bounds, giving up a meaningless safety to end the contest. Final score: Bears 17, Bruins 12, and it was time to rush the field!

But as I, along with several thousand other rabid Cal students, mobbed the players, a lineman was trying to get out of the way and inadvertently (I hope) stomped on my food. My screams of pain were misinterpreted as cries of celebration, and I was forced to limp off the field without assistance. But hey, no pain, no gain. One throbbing appendage was more than worth the ecstasy of defeating my least favorite team in the world.

Fast forward to Saturday. The only pain felt by Bears fans in Memorial Stadium will be nightmarish flashbacks to Maurice Drew’s fourth-quarter brilliance in last year’s Cal-UCLA debacle. Bruins fans, on the other hand, should brace themselves for a world of hurt. Picture the field as one giant voodoo doll; DeSean Jackson sprinting past exhausted cornerbacks for TDs, Marshawn Lynch breaking 24 ankles on an 11-man defensive front, Nate Longshore rifling passes downfield without a defender even sniffing his jersey — these are the pins that will be repeatedly jabbed into the doll.

There won’t be any rushing the field this year, my friends. Just an old-school methodical beat-down.

Go Bears!