Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
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While the Washington Huskies did nothing to boost their profile over the weekend, the UCLA Bruins launched themselves onto the national stage with last night's improbable comeback win over 18th-ranked Tennessee. Assuming the Cougars can take care of business Saturday in Seattle, a BYU win over UCLA would essentially legitimize the Cougars' early-season BCS hopes. With Utah winning at Michigan, East Carolina beating Virginia Tech, and Fresno State travelling to win at Rutgers, BYU needs to keep pace with some of the more popular "would-be BCS busters" from the opening weekend of play. Although a win at Washington will help, beating UCLA has the potential of ending up as a significant feather in BYU's cap.
On the flipside, the Bruins are looking at the BYU game as a chance to prove the Tennessee win was no fluke, and UCLA has almost two full weeks to get ready for the trip to Provo--having executed a late schedule change that swapped a season-opener with Fresno for the move of the Tennessee game to Labor Day (with Fresno then occupying a previous open week in late September).
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The archived second part of Saturday's postgame broadcast coverage (Postgame 2) posted to the web this morning--sorry for the delay.
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Bronco Mendenhall's weekly press conference is live on ksl.com's "X-Stream" channel at 10:00am this morning. It will post on "Cougar Tracks" and the weekly press conference page shortly thereafter.
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I cringed at a few calls from the Pac-10 officiating crew last night. Tough to blame the officials for the lack of useful replays on the Bruins' "pylon touchdown," but I had flashbacks of BYU's multiple instant replay setbacks at the Rose Bowl last year. BYU's best plan of attack: have a comfortable enough margin that a crucial call here or there won't factor into the outcome.
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