DRIVING FORCE : With Help From His Golf Game, Velasco Is Kicking in 50-Yard Range for UCLA

Alfredo Velasco, who took up golf about a year ago, applies the same principles to kicking a football as he does to hitting a golf ball.

“It’s an imperfect art,” said UCLA’s junior kicker, an All-Pacific 10 Conference pick last season. “You’re going to miss. The key is to be consistent and to avoid getting into ruts. Even the best golfers in the world don’t hit the ball onto the fairway every time.”

In golf terms, Velasco nailed a prodigious drive into the middle of the fairway last Saturday, kicking a 50-yard field goal in the third quarter of UCLA’s 24-3 victory over Arizona.

It was the longest field goal of his career--by a yard.

Still, that yard represented a major hurdle for Velasco.

“I don’t think I had a mental block, but I had expectations of making those kicks, 50 yards and over,” said Velasco, who missed a 50-yard attempt last season against California. “It was kind of frustrating not to have kicked one that far. It’s kind of a relief that I’ve done it.”

What he would like to do next is provide a kick that is more than just window dressing in another Bruin rout.

Velasco likes the center stage and the chance to win a game with a last-second field goal.

“It’s every kicker’s dream, and it’s certainly my dream,” he said. “It’s going to happen--it may be this year or next year, but a game is going to be decided by my kicking. I look forward to the challenge.”

Velasco’s chance almost arrived Oct. 1 at Seattle.

UCLA and Washington were tied, 17-17, as UCLA drove down the field in the closing minutes. Velasco, who watched in disbelief only a quarter earlier as his 40-yard field goal attempt sailed wide, paced the sideline, kicking into a net and looking up only long enough to watch each play.

“I was really looking forward to it,” he said of his seemingly impending shot at glory. “I was hoping to be a hero.”

His moment was stolen, however, when quarterback Troy Aikman completed a 48-yard touchdown pass play to Reggie Moore with 1 minute 28 seconds remaining.

Velasco trotted out to kick the extra point.

That has mostly been his role this season, but Velasco has maintained the consistency he showed last season when called upon for field goals. His only miss in 8 attempts was the one at Washington.

And he has yet to miss in 33 conversion attempts.

His 2-season totals: 81 of 82 on extra points and 27 of 32 on field goals, including 25 of 26 from 44 yards or closer.

Velasco brings to the position the same kind of consistency that made former UCLA kicker John Lee a 2-time All-American.

“Quite frankly, he has performed way above our expectations,” UCLA Coach Terry Donahue said of the former walk-on from Burbank High School.

Velasco, who was born in Mexico City and moved with his family to Los Angeles when he was 4, was assigned the kicking chores as a junior at Burbank High after his first day at practice.

His coach, Dave Carson, also suggested that he try the Ben Agajanian kicking camp, where Velasco’s most celebrated classmate was Lee.

Velasco not only copied Lee’s style, but also is wearing Lee’s old number, 25, and is renting a room from Lee’s old benefactor, Oliver Garver, an Episcopalian bishop who befriended Lee several years ago and has continued to rent a room in his West Los Angeles apartment to Bruin football players.

Velasco also has developed Lee’s old confidence.

Donahue said he was surprised last week when Velasco told him he was willing to try the 50-yarder at Arizona.

“I asked about it almost as an afterthought,” Donahue said. “In my mind, we were clearly out of his range. I was expecting him to say, ‘No, it’s too far.’ But he said, ‘Coach, I want to kick this one. I think I can make it.’

“I was amazed at his confidence. He was really quite eager to kick the ball. And so I said, ‘Go kick it.’ And away he went.”

Off went the ball, right through the uprights.

“As long as my form is correct, I think I should make it every time,” Velasco said.

His golf game doesn’t inspire the same confidence.

“I have a lot more success kicking than I do golfing,” he said.

He might not find anyone willing to play him, otherwise.

Bruin Notes

UCLA (7-0) meets Washington State (4-3) Saturday at 12:30 p.m. at the Rose Bowl. . . . UCLA has not opened a season with 8 straight victories since its national championship season of 1954, when it wound up 9-0. . . . Starting time for the Bruins’ game against Oregon Nov. 5 at Eugene, Ore., has been changed from 1 p.m. to 12:30 p.m. to accommodate ABC-TV, which will televise the game.

Washington State’s Steve Broussard, a junior from Los Angeles Manual Arts High who leads the Pacific 10 with 931 yards rushing, is not expected to play against UCLA after spraining an ankle last Saturday in the Cougars’ 31-28 loss to Arizona State. . . . Troy Aikman’s 3 touchdown passes in UCLA’s 24-3 victory over Arizona last Saturday ran his season total to 19. Tom Ramsey set the school record when he threw 21 scoring passes in 1982. Aikman has thrown 36 touchdown passes in 17 games at UCLA.

Aikman, expected to be the No. 1 pick next spring in the National Football League draft, admitted Monday that he keeps an eye on the NFL standings. “I look at the teams and see how they’re doing and wonder where I’ll be next year at this time,” he said. “There are a few teams I’m pulling for to lose, and a few I want to win.” The fifth-year senior declined to reveal where he would like to end up, other than to say: “I don’t like the cold.”