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Win comes with few surprises

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Times Staff Writer

Rewind

Looking back at UCLA’s 45-17 victory over Stanford.

As expected: The Bruins walloped Stanford and, in other news, a tree grows in Palo Alto. Had the Bruins lost, the Internet buzzing from those Bruins fans surgically attached to their computer keyboards might have caused California’s power grid to overload, plunging the state into darkness.

The Bruins racked up 624 yards to pull off the predictable. A 31-point second half demonstrated that offensive coordinator Jay Novell has little in common with Jim Svoboda (his predecessor).

Unexpected: Bruce Davis was held without a sack, but his backup Korey Bosworth had two. The Bruins had four sacks, three by reserve defensive linemen. Defensive end Tom Blake had a sack, while backup defensive tackles Jess Ward, Jerzy Siewierski and Chase Moline held their own.

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Stepped up: A quarterback controversy does not exist at UCLA, which can be stressed in the strongest terms (Ben Olson, 286 yards, five touchdowns). Wait, a tailback controversy, you say? Well, since we have some time to kill before the Brigham Young game . . . starter Chris Markey, 70 yards rushing, backup Kahlil Bell, 195 yards. Coach Karl Dorrell said there would be plenty of carries for both this season, but Bell did a lot more with his 19 carries than Markey did with his 20 against the woeful Cardinal.

OK, discuss among yourselves in Bruins chat rooms.

Stepped back: Actually, no one deserved a scarlet letter for their performance against the Cardinal. If one had to nitpick, cornerback Rodney Van did have a couple “oops” moments on tackles, though his overall play was hardly a problem.

Coach quote: Karl Dorrell said, “Nothing new jumped out at me on the films, just that it was a good solid first performance. . . . We go into a place and get a road win, [of] which we had [only] one a year ago, and played in a convincing fashion that we were the better team.”

Dorrell was pleased with the defensive effort, despite the Bruins’ giving up 331 yards passing.

“Defensively we played real well, except for a handful of plays,” he said. “There were a couple miscues, a couple times we had trouble getting the guy tackled.”

Injury report: Van suffered an ankle injury, but Dorrell said it was nothing serious.

Fast forward

Looking ahead to the game vs. Brigham Young

(Saturday, Rose Bowl, 3:30 p.m., Versus)

First look: Arizona’s Sonny Dykes previously orchestrated the stampede known as the Texas Tech offense. But the Wildcats, and their first-year offensive coordinator, were easily corralled Saturday. Brigham Young held Arizona to 11 first downs and 255 total yards in a 20-7 victory Saturday.

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“If our team comes ready to play, offense, defense, special teams, the way we showed today, it is going to be another beautiful day for the Cougars,” linebacker Bryan Kehl told the Salt Lake Tribune about this week’s matchup with the Bruins.

Topic of the week: Ben Olson, how will it feel to play against Brigham Young? That question was inevitable, yet it first landed a week into August training camp. Olson committed to Brigham Young out of high school and spent a long weekend at Provo. But after a two-year Mormon mission, “Go Westwood, young man” was the advice he followed.

Olson was trying to head that off at the pass. When asked about his former school, he said, “I spent a little time there, but it has been such a long time ago, it’s just another game.”

Olson just flunked Bulletin Board Material 101.

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Season log

Sept. 1

UCLA 45, at Stanford 17

The way Stanford played defense was a Cardinal sin.

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Sept. 8

Brigham Young

The Cougars already have one Pac-10 scalp, Arizona.

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chris.foster@latimes.com

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