Mike Bellotti

There was proper incentive for UCLA's defensive front last week. The Bruins had had four sacks in four games and defensive line coach Todd Howard was tired on missing out. "Sacks are like touchdowns to me," he said. So the deal was simple. "We had a meeting last week and he told us to start making some moves or we were going to be doing a lot of bear crawls out there in practice," tackle Brigham Harwell said. "It was very motivating."

Post-it note on coach's refrigerator: Knock Oregon State out of Rose Bowl. Win "war." Get own team to best bowl game possible. Help settle national title dispute. Pick up half-gallon of milk. It's going to be a things-to-do Saturday for Mike Bellotti. Not only is he coaching Oregon against Oregon State in the 112th reenactment of the Civil War, Bellotti may also have to help resolve another skirmish in the (Big 12 Conference) South.

Oregon Coach Mike Bellotti, monitoring USC's quarterback situation from afar, described it Tuesday as "a nice dilemma" rather than a controversy for the ninth-ranked Trojans. Sophomore Mark Sanchez has started the last two games in place of senior John David Booty, who is trying to come back from a broken right middle finger. "They both can win and if they are both healthy there are some choices to be made," Bellotti said.

An injury-depleted team will try to salvage its Rose Bowl hopes and take a little heat off its coach today. UCLA will be playing as well. Oregon has overcome injuries all season, having lost a starter a week for seven weeks. The latest, though, was the most severe -- quarterback Dennis Dixon suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament against Arizona State on Nov. 3.

Does the UCLA football program truly seek greatness? This is its chance. After years of plodding along underneath the giant shadow of that soaring team from across town, does the UCLA football program really want to fly? This is its moment. Are the gutty little Bruins ready to shed that mantle and become the seething giant Bruins? This could be now. A question that has quietly plagued Bruins football followers for decades -- does our school really care about our sport? -- finally has an answer.

Oregon Coach Mike Bellotti is being wooed by UCLA officials about the Bruins' football coaching job, sources familiar with the search said. Bellotti has been interviewed by UCLA Athletic Director Dan Guerrero, who has pursued the Ducks' coach throughout the process, sources said. Bellotti has listened to UCLA's overtures, according to one source.

LAS VEGAS -- Also on UCLA's to-do list this week: a football game. There has been plenty of buzz about the Bruins on and off the Strip the last four days, though it has little to do with tonight's Las Vegas Bowl game against Brigham Young. UCLA, people might have heard, is looking for a new coach. This has sent Athletic Director Dan Guerrero on a quest for Mr. Right, which is lurching through its third week. It led Oregon Coach Mike Bellotti to shun another Southern California university.

Oregon at Washington isn't just an interesting game with title implications and bowl ramifications: It's probably the Pacific 10 Conference's nastiest annual encounter. UCLA Coach Rick Neuheisel , who absorbed the rivalry's wrath while he was coaching in Washington, calls it "an open wound." UCLA hates USC, Arizona State angers Arizona, Stanford wants to give Cal the ax, but Oregon-Washington is something worse. Some trace it to 1948, when Washington voted with California schools to send Cal to the Rose Bowl instead of an Oregon squad led by quarterback Norm Van Brocklin . In the 1960s, Oregon fans accused Washington of trying to hurt Ducks star Mel Renfro and the animosity intensified when Don James' Washington teams dominated the series, winning all but three times from 1975 to 1992.

"There are enough uniform combinations now that I could coach for 10 more years and never see them all." Mike Bellotti, Oregon coach, on his football team's new uniform color schemes