UCLA vs Hawaii Game Preview | College Football Game Predictions

welcome back to another episode of rock boys football that Sean Foster era getting kicked off for this UCLA program heading on the road week one to play a Hawaii team that you know generated a lot of offseason buzz in that Mountain West Conference and we were able to see Hawaii during week zero playing Delaware State want to get into a few different storylines I think most importantly you know try to figure out and talk about what this UCLA team is going to look like in the 2024 season we're going to get our first taste of this UCLA team that not only is DeShaun Foster taking over this program but there are a lot of new faces coming into this UCLA program and I think a lot of the national media analysts look at UCLA and you know kind of count them out going into the Big 10 I think this team can be a lot more dangerous than a lot of the national media analysts think will get an opportunity to see this kind of UCLA team in a couple of days really excited to get into it now before we do it as always number one would love to hear from you guys in the comment section the best part about doing these game predictions is really just talking aboutall with you guys in the comment section specifically for the UCLA fans would love to see your biggest story lines or what you're really looking for under this Deshawn Foster uccla team and if you all do enjoy the content consider subscribing to the channel the UCLA fans who've been rocking with the boys really for the last year as we talked a lot about UCLA kind of making that transition to Deshawn Foster we can't thank you you guys enough appreciate yall and without further Ado let's get into this one I want to start with this UCLA offense going up against the Hawaii defense that struggled in a lot of departments last year and Delaware State didn't give us a great deal of info on this Hawaii defense but going back to last year this was a defense that gave up 33.3 points per game that was 113th in the country they struggled to stop the run giving up 4.8 yards per carry but I think most importantly you know Hawaii gave up a lot of explosive plays in the passing attack 8.9 yards per pass that was almost dead last in the FBS and so my question for UCLA is how do you want this football game to look and what's your identity going to be on the offensive side of the football now if I were to project and kind of predict what this UCLA offense is going to be from an identity standpoint with Eric beamy coming in tohaa Foster as your head coach I think they're still going to want to run the football because you look at this offensive line and say you got what four red shirt seniors and red shirt Jr projected the start on this offensive line this is a big offensive line it's an experienced offensive line it's an old offensive line I mean there a lot of grown men on this offensive line you have a guy like TJ Harden in the backfield with DeShawn Foster as the head coach I would be not very surprised if we saw this UCLA team really take the identity of hey we want to control the line of scrimmage and we want to run the football now I think the big question mark in this football game is you know UCL is going to have success running the football football Hawaii's probably going to have to walk some safeties into the box to try to stop the run my biggest question mark is can UCLA marry that run game with that explosive downfield passing attack I don't know if many of you guys watched the Florida state Georgia Tech game but you just saw Florida State really fail to do that right Florida State got off to running the football Georgia Tech answered with hey we're gonna put some safties in the Box give you that seven eight man box look and we're going to beg you to throw the football down the field Florida they just didn't really do that what I'm looking for here with coach benmy and desha Foster is that we want to run the football we're probably going to force Hawaii to you know put some extra Bodies In The Tackle Box can we ask Ethan garbers to push the ball down the field effectively he has the wide receivers to do it I think most notably a guy like Jay Michael sturdivan who is one of the more Dynamic and explosive vertical wide receivers that we'll see in the Big 10 and I think a guy like Ethan gares he just flies under the radar where everybody wanted to talk about you know quarterback Dante Moore last year which I certainly don't blame the national media analyst and the UCLA fans for wanting to talk about Dante Moore one of the most impressive High School prospects I've seen in quite a long time but you look at Ethan garbers and say this kid was extremely talented coming out of high school as well he has some juice he has the ability to make all those throws that the Shawn Foster and Eric benamy are going to ask him to make and so when you start running the football and you start having those opportunities to go play action and push the ball down the field can Ethan garbage be that quarterback to make those kind of throws I think he has the weapons on the outside to do so that's probably what I'm going to be looking for the most in this matchup against Hawaii now flipping over to the defensive side of the football it is absolutely no secret what Hawaii wants to do on offense right Timmy Chang as the head coach you have a quarterback and Braden shagger who he's got an arm I think this was a quarterback that I thought would be on the move to a power five program or power four program in the off season he stays at Hawaii this is Hawaii offense that last year threw the football 64% of the time that was number one in the country and it wasn't particularly close this is a pretty one-dimensional offense in terms of throwing football my biggest question mark is what is this UCLA pass rush look where you go back to 2023 what made that UCLA defense one of the better units we saw not only in the conference but in the country it was that pass rush and I don't think a lot of UCLA fans are expecting the pass rush to be as good it's really hard to replace a guy like the Murphy Brothers or a guy like lbu but how good can it be I mean Deshawn Foster this UCLA program got aggressive in the transfer portal add adding some guys in that edge rusher room how do those transfers look are we still able to impact the quarterback heading into the Big 10 in 2024 that's probably the biggest question mark I have because I look at the linebackers and say I'm really high on that unit I think the secondary is going to be good I think Hawaii is probably going to struggle to consistently create separation against this UCLA secondary my eyeballs are going to be on the pass rush now you look on the inside and say we feel pretty good about Jay and Gary Smith but on the outside what do the edge rushers look like can they kind of provide that juice in the pass rush that UCLA had in abundance last year probably the biggest question mark and storyline that I'll be following in this football game now getting into the pick here this Line's moved around right a couple days ago before the Delaware State game was at 13 and a half inside of two touchdowns is up to 14 and a half now I still like UCLA here and I like UCLA because I think they'll be able to play the football game on their terms you look at UCLA controlling the time possession running the football those are probably the two numbers that you are looking for and say hey I don't need to see the scoreboard show me how UCLA ran the football and what the time of possession looks like and I'll probably get a pretty good feel about how this football game went and if UCLA can hit some of those explosive plays in the passing attack that Hawaii struggled to stop so much in 2023 I think UCLA is probably going to open up this football game I'm really excited about this game the Sha Foster era kicking off at UCLA we said this kind of throughout the offseason this is a program that it has a lot of potential and Deshawn Foster is injecting the kind of juice that a lot of uccla fans were looking for around this program now you got to go put it on the field really excited about it we'll probably break bre this one down Monday morning maybe Tuesday Morning appreciate you guys rocking with it again if youall do enjoy the content consider subscribing to the channel appreciate you guys and we'll talk to y'all later