UCLA’s Jim Mora says every year is different even as another October swoon hits

October is the cruelest month around the UCLA football program.

UCLA has a 6-7 record in October under Coach Jim Mora heading into Thursday’s game against California at the Rose Bowl.

Mora was understandably reticent about discussing the subject with two games still to play this month. Asked if he could identify reasons for the Bruins’ yearly October tailspin, he said, “No. Every year is a different year. It’s nothing that I know of.”

The past two seasons, the Bruins have been on the rise through September, reaching the top 10 in the Associated Press media poll, only to be sent reeling. They were ranked ninth in 2013 before back-to-back losses to Stanford and Oregon. They were No. 8 last season but dropped consecutive games to Utah and Oregon.

UCLA was ranked ninth when October began this season, but has lost to Arizona State and Stanford.

The Bruins have lost only four other regular-season games in the four years Mora has been head coach.

UCLA’s annual swoon, however, can’t be put on Mora. The Bruins had a record of 7-17 in October games the previous six seasons, when the head coaches were Rick Neuheisel and Karl Dorrell.

The difference: those Neuheisel and Dorrell teams never won more than seven games in a season. Mora’s 2012 team won nine games, and the Bruins have won 10 games in each of the last two seasons.

UCLA does enjoy a distinct advantage over most college programs because it can operate more or less as an NFL team until classes begin in late September. The Bruins are now in school, with midterms approaching.

“Those are just excuses. They are reasons, but I’m not going to make excuses,” Mora said, ending the conversation.

Honoring a cause

The Bruins will support National Breast Cancer Awareness Month by having breast cancer survivors who are relatives of players and coaches act as honorary captains for Thursday’s game.

“We have players and others in our department who have been affected by breast cancer,” said Mora, whose grandmother died from breast cancer and whose mother is a two-time survivor. “We’re going to walk them out onto the field and honor their courage.”

The Bruins will have a pink ribbon on their helmets, but won’t go to great lengths to display the color.

“All the pink towels, pink shoes and the pink wristbands, sometimes it becomes more about the fashion than the cause,” Mora said. “The cause is breast cancer awareness, not looking cool in pink.”

Lost rivals?

There was a time when UCLA versus California was a big football rivalry, though the passion seems to have waned in recent years.

“It’s our rival Cal, so it should be fun,” was how Mora put it Tuesday.

Fun was not how the late Ducky Drake, a UCLA student, track coach and trainer, used to refer to competitions between the schools.

Drake gave a fiery annual speech to the Bruins football team about the need to beat the Bears.

Cal Coach Sonny Dykes didn’t sound as if he was ready to rally any deep-seated UCLA resentment. “It’s hard for me to talk about it because I haven’t been around that long,” the third-year coach of the Bears said. “We haven’t been good since I have been here, so it may have partly lost a little luster.”

Dykes did offer this much: “It’s a big game for us. We have a lot of players from Southern California. They always get excited about getting to go home and play in front of their family and friends.”

But even that angle was downplayed by Jared Goff, Cal’s star quarterback. “It’s the same when we play USC in Los Angeles,” he said. “Guys from L.A. are excited for it. I’m from up here, so it’s just another game to me.”

Contradictions

California is ranked 20th in the Associated Press media poll coming into the game. UCLA is unranked. It is the first time the Bears have been higher in the AP poll since 2007, when they were ranked 10th and the Bruins were unranked.

Yet, UCLA was a 3 1/2-point favorite as of Tuesday.

Follow Chris Foster on Twitter @cfosterlatimes