Holy crap.  It was October 6th and we got our first victory in football.  About damn time, in my humble opinion.  Anyways, I don't have much more to say than good for the team.  They were probably happier than most of the Irish faithful and they deserve it.  They didn't quit and that's good to see for a young team.  They got the monkey off the back and can focus on other things now.  Here's this week's `The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly':

The Good:

Winning - I already touched on it but it really is great to get the monkey off our team's back.  This is exactly what a young team needs and I think it might help get some things rolling.  A lot of people at the Rose Bowl said that the team was exuberant after the win and you've got to like that.  It took 6 games, but they finally got a `W'.

Maurice Crum & the Defense - Wow.  Just wow.  I know we've been a little tough on Crum, and I think for some really valid reasons, but he played out of his mind on Saturday.  Sure, he was in the right place at the right time on some of his plays, but you can't fake 4 turnovers.  It's good to see the defense in general play with some passion and aggressiveness that we hadn't seen in awhile.  I don't think Rick Minter would have played defense that way and that is a credit to Corwin Brown's philosophy.  I don't think we have top 20 talent on defense and it's a good thing that we are making up our lack of talent with some aggressive playcalling on defense.  Freshmen Brian Smith and Kerry Neal avoided some of the mental mistakes from last year and played outstanding when blitzing.  Toryan Smith made some nice plays and Tommy Zbikowski even looked like a decent blitzer.  I can't agree with those who discount our success because we were playing a redshirt-freshman as we looked pretty good with Ben Olson in there.  It definitely helped that he got hurt but we were playing pretty good defense as it was.

Special Teams - After missing 5 points worth in the Purdue game, our kicking game finally found the uprights on Saturday.  Brandon Walker connected for 2 field goals, which included a 48-yarder, and kicked 2 extra points in his best game to date.  I think Walker has the ability to be a very good kicker, he just needs some game experience and a little more coaching.  Our punt return coverage was terrific, giving UCLA only 4 yards on 2 punt returns.  David Bruton is literally the best gunner I have ever seen on a football field.  The punting team, led by Geoff Price and JJ Jansen, were also able to pin the UCLA offense back to the 1 yard line in the 3rd quarter.  Great game for the special teams, which is something we don't usually say when talking about a Notre Dame team.

The Bad:

The Offense - This is an inch away from being `ugly', but I'll bump it up to `bad' considering they were able to keep the ball away from the UCLA defense with no interceptions or fumbles lost.  Why can't we see a game that puts together our rushing game from Michigan State and our passing game from Purdue?  I suppose UCLA is better on defense than MSU and PU, but you would think our offense that had been improving could put up more than 140 yards and 1.2 YPC on a PAC-10 defense.  We looked pretty pathetic on offense the entire game, save for an occasional Armando Allen run or Duval Kamara supercatch.  I will applaud the offense for one thing and that was the quarterback sneak that worked beautifully on our first touchdown.  We hadn't seen that type of play for awhile.  We ran it behind Sullivan and Turkovich and they just swallowed their defenders.  One note: I heard Golden Tate had a concussion on Saturday and that explains his absence later in the game.  George West was also banged up after he hurt his ankle.  This might explain the screen pass to DJ Hord later on in the game.

Red zone playcalling - Fact: Charlie Weis tries to get too cute too much of the time.  If you can't get a half of a yard in a goal line situation, you might as well not field a squad.  The pass call to Clausen was one of the more insulting things I have seen out of Weis and there is no excuse for that.  We were able to convert on one quarterback sneak in the game so we were definitely able to produce.  I guess the pass play might have been better than a Travis Thomas or Asaph Schwapp run but there is nothing worse than seeing an offense unable to earn 1 yard to score a touchdown.  It still upsets me today.

The Ugly:

Nothing - We won a game.  I'm going to try and be a lot happier and less negative.  This is my first attempt.  Go Irish!