Donahue Gets Boot Out of One Bruin : UCLA: Maggio’s punting average of 44.8 yards has been a bright spot in what has been a dismal season to this point.

In an otherwise dark season for UCLA’s football team, Kirk Maggio has provided a little light. That he is a punter says a lot about the kind of season it has been for the Bruins.

Maggio, though, has been more than just another punter.

His average of 44.8 yards a punt, including a career-best 61-yarder against Arizona last Saturday, ranks third in the National Collegiate Athletic Assn.

It obviously is not enough to take Terry Donahue’s mind off the Bruins’ disappointing 3-3 record, but Maggio’s consistency has been as much an eye-opener for the coach as UCLA’s lack of success.

A dismal spring by the senior from Glen Arm, Md., left Donahue “gravely concerned” about the Bruins’ punting game.

But Maggio’s punting this fall has been the Bruins’ most pleasant surprise, Donahue said.

Why the improvement?

“I don’t know what the difference is, other than I think he thought I was going to strangle him,” Donahue said this month, joking with reporters.

Then, as an aside, Donahue added: “Maybe he was in love.”

As it turns out, a spring romance was Maggio’s problem.

At least, that’s what he says.

“I had a girlfriend I was very much (involved with) and I think that really hurt me,” he said. “I wasn’t focused in the spring.”

But, in the summer, a young man’s fancy lightly turns to . . .

Punting?

“I went home to Maryland while she was still here and I kicked twice a day,” Maggio said. “I’d kick during the day and then kick at night. I don’t think I went out but twice all summer. I’d kick from my patio out into the back yard, then get the flashlight and round up the balls. It really helped me a lot.”

Then, after he returned to Westwood, his girlfriend broke up with him. “I think that’s the main reason (for the improvement),” he said. “I’ve been all football.”

His focus restored, Maggio set about attaining his goal of a 48-yard average, which would assuredly draw interest from National Football League scouts.

“I feel very good and very confident,” he said.

Ray Pelfrey of Sparks, Nev., a former NFL punter and mentor to scores of college and professional punters, believes that Maggio may have a future in the NFL.

“Last summer, he was punting at a pro level,” Pelfrey said. “We have eight punters from my program in the NFL and so we’ve got a yardstick to measure him against--and he’s got a shot.”

Pelfrey is not surprised by Maggio’s success this season.

“He’s an exceptional athlete,” he said. . He’s very quick and he’s got really fine hands. He’s probably got as good a set of hands as any player I’ve ever seen, in terms of ball-handling ability and assuredness. And he’s got very good leg speed. He’s not as big as some of the punters I’ve put in the NFL, but he certainly has a faster leg than some of them. When he hits the ball properly, he gets above-average hang time.”

It is because he is not as worried about striking the ball properly that the 6-foot, 158-pound Maggio has been able to improve his average, Maggio said. In his first three seasons at UCLA, Maggio was the “pooch” punter, called upon only in short-distance situations to angle his kicks into the corners. He averaged 33.8 yards in 22 punts.

This season, Maggio replaced the graduated Harold Barkate as the Bruins’ regular punter and, of course, was expected to add distance to his kicks.

Last summer, his practice partner, Sean Landeta of the New York Giants, told him to concern himself less with technique and more with getting his foot into the ball.

“I worried too much about whether my steps were right,” Maggio said. “I was pumping instead of punting. The emphasis (now) is on just killing the ball, putting everything I’ve got into it.

“(Landeta) told me just to kick the hell out of the ball and I’m just trying to crush each punt.”

Maggio used a similar strategy to earn a scholarship to UCLA.

He was a quarterback and place-kicker at Calvert Hall College High in Towson, Md., and was planning to kick at Maryland as a walk-on.

A pulled groin muscle, however, altered Maggio’s destiny. Because of the injury, he was unable to kick at a camp conducted by Pelfrey in New Jersey. Instead, he concentrated on punting.

Pelfrey liked his potential as a punter and invited him to a camp two months later in Wilmington, Ohio. Meantime, Pelfrey contacted several schools, among them UCLA, and invited their representatives to the camp to make their own evaluations.

It figured to be a nerve-racking experience for the young punters, but Maggio said he was unaffected when Pelfrey told him that UCLA was coming to see him.

For one thing, he didn’t think he’d be interested in going to school 3,000 miles from home. For another, he wasn’t sure that the Bruins would show up.

Bill Rees, however, did show up, as promised, and UCLA’s recruiting coordinator later reported to Donahue, who called that night to offer Maggio a recruiting trip.

So, on the day he was supposed to report to camp at Maryland, Maggio instead boarded a jet bound for Los Angeles. When Maryland heard about the Bruins’ interest, the Terrapins offered Maggio a scholarship, but Maggio’s father didn’t tell him about the offer until they were in the car driving toward the airport.

“He wanted to make sure that I would at least make the trip and see UCLA so that I wouldn’t regret it five years down the line,” Maggio said. “I’m really happy I made the choice that I did.”

So are the Bruins.