On Sunday, Bruin fans woke up to the shocking news that, in a move so atypical of everything we’ve come to expect from UCLA, Jim Mora had been fired with immediate effect as the UCLA Football head coach the day after a third consecutive loss to USC, and that Mora’s gargantuan buyout of nearly $12 million had been covered, presumably by large donors to the program.
The future of the program will be discussed plenty in the coming hours, days, and weeks, but the immediate aftermath of the move calls for reflection more than anything else. Mora’s first three seasons at UCLA had Bruin fans feeling genuine pride that hadn’t existed around the football program basically since 1998.