A Low-Cal Banquet

It must be nice for the Bruins to know that when they don’t play well, they can still rely on gimmicks and flukes. Much of the first half of Saturday night’s game against California was a fundamentals nightmare for UCLA. The offensive line let California defenders maul quarterback Cory Paus; he was sacked four times. A week after the Bruins held Washington to minus-eight rushing yards, the Bears ran for 80 in the first two quarters. The Bruins were penalized six times for 55 yards. Penalties played key parts in both of California’s first-half scoring drives.

And yet they still led by 11 points at halftime.

It took a gadget play for the Bruins to get their first touchdown. It took the fickle flight of a feeble football for them to get their third. But it still goes down as a 56-17 victory over California. The numbers should fit well into the various formulas used to tabulate the BCS rankings. However, any Associated Press and ESPN/USA Today voters watching the first half could not have been that impressed. And by the time the Bruins showed some signs of dominance in the second half, it was well after midnight on the East Coast.

Anyone who was watching must have thought it was a rerun of the old UCLA offenses. Coach Bob Toledo has scaled back on the flashy stuff and the aerial wonders this season. The Bruins have twice as many rushing attempts as passing attempts. Last year, the run-pass ratio was about 1.2 to 1.

There was no longer a need to be so risky now that the defense is shutting down opponents. The Bruins were into mundane stuff such as playing for field position. Although there are few better sights in sports right now than DeShaun Foster running the football, it made things a little different at the Rose Bowl.

Those Pasadena Saturdays used to be like a fireworks show. Now it’s like a day at the beach, watching the awesome beauty of the waves rolling into shore. Something about the Bears brought out the trickster in Toledo. Maybe it was the sight of Cal offensive coordinator Al Borges. Borges used to be Toledo’s right-hand man at UCLA, but he took the unusual route of a lateral move within the same conference in part because he craves a head coaching job and found it hard to get noticed under Toledo.

Although Borges called the plays, Toledo got all of the credit for UCLA’s pretty offensive output. (Meanwhile, the defensive coordinators got the blame--and the dismissal notices--for letting the opponents score at will. Nice deal for Bob.) Can’t say Toledo didn’t give the Bears fair warning. After using the traditional serpentine huddle break for the first play of homecoming, the Bruins made a direct snap to Foster.

But after a couple of three-and-out possessions, Toledo went to the gag section of the playbook. The Bruins ran a double reverse, with Foster handing to Tab Perry, who gave the ball to Craig Bragg. Bragg took the ball down the right sideline for a 42-yard touchdown. It wasn’t merely for show. It actually worked exactly as designed.

Then they went to work on a standard, 76-yard drive that gave them a 14-10 lead. Now if there’s actually a name for the play that resulted in UCLA’s third touchdown, we can just go ahead and name Toledo the coach of the year.

On first down from the Cal 34-yard line, Cory Paus was hit while throwing. The ball floated through the air ... and right into the hands of Foster. Could there be a better player to occupy that spot on the field for UCLA than Foster? (Is there a better player than Foster on any spot on any college football field? But that’s a different column).

Once Foster caught the ball, you knew what he’d do from there. He burst outside and chugged into the end zone. Bear cornerback Ray Carmel pursued him to the corner, but Foster beat him to the spot. Carmel must have had some second thoughts about trying to tackle Foster after seeing what happened to his teammate, Bert Watts, in the first quarter.

Watts tried to tackle Foster head-on. Foolish mortal. Foster knocked him on his back and sent Watts’ helmet flying.

UCLA came out firing in the second half. Paus threw a 40-yard pass to Mike Seidman, then followed that with a 27-yard touchdown strike to Ryan Smith.

Paus also threw a 58-yard pass to Bragg, who was tackled at the Cal 1-yard line to set up an easy toss to Ed Ieremia-Stansbury. Special teams, which have had their shaky moments, came through with a blocked punt for a touchdown.

This might have been Paus’ most complete game to date. His 273 yards passing were a season high. He connected on the long balls and also showed some good judgment and nice touch on the short passes. His best pass of the night might have been the softest ball he threw. On a second-quarter play he ran through the progression of receivers, then saw Ieremia-Stansbury open over the middle and lofted a short pass to set up third and short. And when he wasn’t smart or strong, he was fortunate.

Smart, strong and lucky is a tough combination to beat. That’s why the Bruins are undefeated.

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J.A. Adande can be reached at: j.a.adande@latimes.com.