Looking for identity
Greetings from Austin, Texas, folks, where I walked off the plane to a balmy 37 degrees this morning.
It's early in the hoops season, and Bruins center Alfred Aboya said that means teams are trying to find an identity, UCLA included.
"A lot of teams are trying to figure out where they are as a team,'' Aboya said. "We don't know ourselves yet. We're still looking searching for that.''
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About Inside UCLA
This is Brian Dohn's sixth season covering UCLA after spending 4 1/2 years covering the Dodgers for the Daily News and other Los Angeles Newspaper Group papers. He graduated from Rutgers, where the first college football game was played in 1869. Sure, the Scarlet Knights suffered for a long time, but now RU is doing what Jerseyans always thought was possible. Winning at Rutgers also proves winning is possible everywhere else in the nation, so underachieving coaches better be careful. Now, if only men's hoops can turn it around.
Alfred, let me help you out!
You, sir, are an affable Cameroonian with a big heart and larger political aspirations playing for the UCLA Bruins -- one of the elite programs in college basketball and certainly the most accomplished. With B2B2B F4s under your belt, you are now a senior leader and must step up to the challenge to fill the coid in the middle left by the departure of LLL (Love, Luc and Lorenzo, of course) You must stay out of foul trouble and be a monster on the glass. If you defned and rebound -- and nothing else, that would be good. Find a way to average 10 points this season and I'll give you a big smooch (not literally, figuratively. UB only swings one way). Take Drew and Bobo under your wing and mold them into great defensive players and show them how to relentlessly pound the glass. Inspire the younger players to acheive a level of performance that will make the Wizard of Westwood proud (and keep Ben from making them endure marathon film sessions). Get together with Josh and Darren. Inspire them to acheive greatness this year. You three senior starters must rise to the challenge and the legacy of the program. Never quit. Always give 100% (I never say 110% because in this instance it is impossible). Do that, my friend, and at the end of the road, greatness will be this team's identity. Now, I must go and wipe the tear from my eye.