Historians looking back at the 2025 UCLA football season will appreciate Penn State game as the Bruins' first win.
In both big and small ways they will be wrong.
When Tim Skipper was the first to take over. The team added a new opponent to the schedule a month ago: the locker room. The interim coach showed the players pictures of what it would look like, including the locker rooms and surrounding floor.
They cleaned the place out and it's been spotless ever since. Kind of like the Bruins game, starting with that Penn State game.
“I think a clean locker room makes you a lot happier,” Skipper explained this week. “It shows team discipline and shows that you can win off the field, so now you can go ahead and go on the field.”
Skipper's other main motivational tool, besides his easily conveyed energy, was slogans. He started by advising his players to push themselves and give it their all to win. After the Bruins beat Penn State, he asked the players if they were one-hit wonders. Now that his players have proven they know what it takes to win after hit Michiganhe asks them to maintain their approach.
At their meeting Sunday, the Bruins saw their new mantra – the standard is the standard – on the big screen.
“We've identified the style of play that we want to be and now it's our job to maintain the standard with the standard, you know, play with fanatical effort, play with the fundamentals, be smart, you know, all those things we just have to keep doing,” Skipper said. “But it's not something that's just going to happen on Saturday. You have to practice it. You have to work at it, not just talk about it.”
Can the Bruins keep it going after two straight wins? Here are five things to watch Saturday afternoon at the Rose Bowl when UCLA (2-4 overall, 2-1 Big Ten) takes on Maryland (4-2, 1-2):
