Injuries have hampered UCLA, but another losing season could still cost Jim Mora his job

Back-to-back losing seasons are rare at UCLA, though they don’t necessarily result in the dismissal of the head coach.

Terry Donahue endured consecutive losing seasons in 1989 and 1990, the last time the Bruins went two straight years without going to a bowl game.

Donahue survived to coach another season at UCLA — five more, in fact — but he had built up considerable equity by then. The Bruins had gone to bowl games in the seven seasons immediately preceding the worst funk of Donahue’s career, going 7-0. Three of those triumphs came in the Rose Bowl.

Jim Mora took UCLA to bowl games in each of his first four seasons, when his 37 victories tied Donahue for the most in any four-year stretch in Bruins history. None of UCLA’s bowl games under Mora have been of the top-tier variety, however, a factor that could weigh in any assessment of his future.

The Bruins (4-5 overall, 2-4 Pac-12 Conference) will need to win two of their final three games this season to gain bowl eligibility, barring the possibility that they beep-beep-beep their way into a bowl with a 5-7 record because of a lack of teams with at least .500 records to fill all the available slots.

But would a just-scraping-by bowl game be enough to save Mora’s job in the wake of a 4-8 season the year before? UCLA athletic director Dan Guerrero told The Times in December that his expectation for 2017 was for the Bruins to contend for the Pac-12 championship, a benchmark the team is obviously not meeting while tied with Colorado and Utah for last place in the Pac-12 South.

Mora’s contract, which runs through the 2021 season and includes a buyout of roughly $12 million, might be one element working in his favor. He could also point to widespread injuries as a reason his team has underachieved the last two seasons.

Quarterback Josh Rosen missed the final six games of 2016 with a shoulder injury and the Bruins’ 48-17 loss to Utah on Friday with a concussion that had sidelined him the previous week against Washington. His backup, Devon Modster, left the game against the Utes in the third quarter after hitting his thumb on his helmet, forcing the team to go with third-stringer Matt Lynch.

“Any time you’re fighting with your backup quarterback and your third guy,” Mora said after the game, “that’s a factor.”

UCLA is also woefully thin at linebacker, where Krys Barnes became the latest player to go down Friday when he suffered a recurrence of fluid buildup in his lungs. The Bruins were already without linebackers Breland Brandt (concussion) and Josh Woods (shoulder) and have had to weather injuries along the defensive line to Matt Dickerson (collarbone) and Rick Wade (knee), among others.

Injuries have been just as acute on offense. Receiver Darren Andrews suffered a knee ligament injury against Utah that is likely to end his season, joining tailback Nate Starks and tight end Caleb Wilson on the list of top players who are out for an extended period.

Of course, that’s only a partial excuse for an offense that generated a trickle of production after halftime against Utah, churning out 19 yards in the third quarter and 70 yards in the second half. For the game, Bruins punter Stefan Flintoft produced more yards (364) than UCLA’s offense (249).

The Bruins’ defense has been even more abysmal. The run defense ranks as the worst in the nation and the secondary failed to cover receivers Friday even on plays when defensive backs weren’t running into each other.

UCLA can only hope that a return to the Rose Bowl, where it has gone 4-0 this season, serves as rejuvenation next week against Arizona State.

“We’ll just keep fighting,” Mora said, “and the next man has to step up and do the best they can.”

Hand it to him

If nothing else, UCLA could at least stake claim to the play of the game against Utah. It came in the second quarter when receiver Theo Howard extended his right arm to snag a pass with one hand before pulling it back into his body for a 26-yard completion.

“We were kind of hand-fighting down the field,” Howard said of himself and the defensive back, “and I just knew I couldn’t get both hands up so I just tried the best I could to see if I could get one out, and fortunately it stuck right there in place.”

ben.bolch@latimes.com

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