This Could Provide Some Food for Thought

What athletes eat before big games apparently does matter. The late Red Sanders blamed a UCLA loss to Stanford in 1951 on the team’s pregame meals.

According to “Stadium Stories,” Chris Roberts’ book about UCLA football, Sanders claimed someone at the Bruins’ hotel in Palo Alto had purposely overfed his team.

For the night before the game, Sanders had ordered New York steaks. But the players instead were served two-inch thick slabs of prime rib. The next morning they were given steak and potatoes, then went out and were lethargic in the 21-7 loss.

The night before Saturday’s game against USC, the Bruins get a choice of beef or fish, and the light pregame meal on Saturday will probably consist of chicken and pasta.

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Trivia time: Who was the running back at Los Angeles Wilson High who won the first Red Sanders Memorial Scholarship in 1959 and went on to star on the Bill Barnes-coached Bruin teams in the early 1960s?

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Starvation works too: In 1962, when John Madden was the coach at Hancock College in Santa Maria, his team traveled to play an important game against Porterville College.

“We had reservations to eat our pregame meal at a restaurant in Porterville,” Madden once recalled. “But when we got to the restaurant, we were told that someone from the college had called and canceled our reservation.

“There was no other restaurant in town that could accommodate us, so we had to play the game on an empty stomach and we lost.”

So if you’re wondering if Madden has ever missed a meal, the answer is yes.

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Cause for concern: For years, former UCLA coach Terry Donahue has bet a lunch on the outcome of the USC-UCLA game with some USC friends, including longtime booster Gary Jennison.

“One year, I’ve got to settle up with Jennison, or maybe he was buying my lunch,” Donahue said. “Anyway, we went in Jennison’s car, and on the way to the Ritz in Newport Beach, a police car followed us for maybe two miles and pulled up behind us in the parking lot.

“I asked the officer what the problem was, and he said, ‘Just wondering if you’re OK.’ He then pointed to Jennison’s license plate, which read ‘USC NO 1’.”

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Looking back: On this day in 1987, Bo Jackson had one of the more memorable performances on “Monday Night Football,” rushing for 221 yards in 18 carries and scoring three touchdowns in a 37-14 Los Angeles Raider victory in Seattle’s Kingdome. He had 202 yards in his first 11 carries and had a 91-yard touchdown run in which he kept on going and disappeared in a runway behind the end zone.

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Trivia answer: Mitch Dimkich, who besides being a star athlete at Wilson was also senior class president and a top student.

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And finally: Vince Young, appearing on FSN’s “Best Damn Sports Show Period,” was asked to rank the Heisman Trophy contenders.

“No. 1, me; No. 2, Bush; and No. 3, Leinart,” he said.

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Larry Stewart can be reached at larry.stewart@latimes.com.