UCLA (4-5, 3-4 Big Ten) at Washington (5-5, 3-4), Friday, 9 p.m. EST (FOX)

BetMGM College Football Odds: Washington by 4.

Series record: UCLA leads 42-32-2.

WHAT’S AT STAKE?

With a victory over the Bruins, the Huskies would clinch bowl eligibility. This would seem to be the Huskies best shot at securing a postseason berth, with No. 1 ranked Oregon looming in the regular season finale next week. UCLA is also playing for bowl eligibility and needs to win two of its final three games to get to six wins. The Bruins play USC next week.

KEY MATCHUP

UCLA run defense vs. Jonah Coleman. The Bruins’ run defense is allowing an average of 98.1 rushing yards per game, third-best in the Big Ten. Coleman, meanwhile, is averaging 6 yards a carry, and has the conference’s fourth-most yards on the ground this season, with 913. Coleman is 19th in the country in rushing yards, while UCLA’s run defense ranks seventh.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

UCLA: LB Carson Schwesinger was named the Big Ten defensive player of the week after hauling in two interceptions and making seven tackles in the Bruins’ 20-17 win over Iowa on Saturday. Schwesinger leads the Big Ten with 10.2 total tackles per game, and has 6.2 solo tackles per game, and 92 total tackles this season.

Washington: Freshman QB Demond Williams Jr. has gotten playing time in every game this season in relief of fifth-year senior Will Rogers, and played the entire second half in the Huskies’ blowout loss last week to Penn State. It’s clear that head coach Jedd Fisch sees the speedy Williams as the quarterback of the future for the Huskies, and if things devolve into a blowout for either team on Friday, Williams will likely see extended snaps.

FACTS & FIGURES

Washington has won 19 consecutive home games, the longest home win streak in modern school history. … Washington ranks No. 3 in FBS in passing yards allowed, No. 5 in pass efficiency defense, No. 19 in total defense, and No. 27 in scoring defense. Washington receiver Denzel Boston is tied for the Big Ten lead and is No. 6 (tied) in FBS with nine touchdown receptions. … The Bruins enter the game with a three-game winning streak, all against Big Ten teams. … Quarterback Ethan Garbers completed 21 of 34 passes for 203 yards and two touchdowns in win against Iowa, his fourth multi-touchdown game of the season, and ninth of his career.

Sam Cosmi took it upon himself to deliver the message. His Washington Commanders teammates needed to hear what the right guard had to say in the locker room following the team’s 28-27 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers on Sunday. 

“I wanted them to know that to not let this snowball effect into next week,” Cosmi said. “I wanted them to know what we have here is still special. Like no matter what, we still keep fighting. I wanted them to know this should hurt. This should hurt your core. This means a lot to us.”

Cosmi played during the Ron Rivera era of the Commanders – four years of dismal on-field results and mounting off-field scandals that were linked not to the team but rather former owner Dan Snyder. But Josh Harris and his partners purchased the team last summer. Adam Peters was hired to take control of football operations, and Dan Quinn has thrived in his second chance as a coach in the NFL. The Commanders are 7-3 and face the Philadelphia Eagles (7-2) on “Thursday Night Football” with the NFC East lead on the line. 

With the looming short week, Cosmi’s allocution set the tone of moving on from a loss in which the Commanders blew a 10-point lead at home. The fourth-year offensive lineman also, perhaps without realizing it, offered his own assessment of the transformation of an entire franchise – and the heightened expectations that come with doing so. 

“What Dan Quinn has done, what Adam Peters has done, is change the culture,” Cosmi told reporters. “We don’t have the most talented team, but we have a hard-working team.

“Winning is the ultimate goal. And like I know from the past, this means a lot, not only to me, but to everybody. So just to keep their heads up and keep fighting, and let’s get ready to beat Philly.”

Accelerated expectations

Before the loss to Pittsburgh, Washington had not started a season 7-2 in 28 years. Although the lower bowl of Northwest Stadium was filled with yellow “Terrible Towels,” the Commanders say they have sold out every home game this season and had a 90% renewal rate on season tickets, according to the Washington Post. Gate receipts are up 20%, and the team has signed 29 new sponsorship deals in the past year. 

Having the presumptive Offensive Rookie of the Year in quarterback Jayden Daniels, the No. 2 pick and reigning Heisman Trophy winner, sped up the turnaround. But the organizational infrastructure, offensive line and coaching provided to the 23-year-old has made his transition to the NFL smoother, although Daniels has nursed a rib injury since Week 7.

There is also fan excitement – from the viral clip of a fan pre-celebrating the Hail Mary victory against the Chicago Bears in October to players and coaches saying they can actually feel energy from the home crowd.

Daniels’ historic start cooled down in a Week 6 loss to the Baltimore Ravens. Washington showed it could hang with a team that has an “entrenched” identity, as Quinn said. The next day, Quinn was asked whether winning the NFC East had become the expectation for the team. The coach said the team rarely discussed expectations, but that it was a goal mentioned at the beginning of the season.  

“We don’t try to get jammed up on expectations or things that are down the line or any of that,” Quinn said. “We just try to dig right into this week and say, ‘This is, you know, we’re based on improvement.’ It’s like a lifestyle we live here, man. Can you get better? Can you dig in further? Can you get to that spot? And so that’s kind of the stressor that we go and not on outside expectations. 

“I recognize the question about the division because it is really important to talk about that, but you don’t really talk about those until you talk about the division games when you’re playing in them.”

Washington is 2-0 in NFC East games this year, both victories against the New York Giants. Four of their final eight games are against either the Eagles or Dallas Cowboys. 

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Culture is key to rapid turnaround

The Commanders finished last in the division during Rivera’s final two seasons and cratered at 4-13 in 2023. A coaching search yielded Quinn, the former Atlanta Falcons head coach who had spent the previous three seasons leading the Cowboys’ defense. 

“I didn’t really understand culture. I haven’t been a part of a ‘good culture,’” Cosmi said. “This year, I’m slowly but surely – I see it. It’s really cool to see and be a part of. Talking and acting on it. So I’m excited about that.”

Five years ago, then-general manager Bruce Allen said the “culture is actually damn good” in Washington, and the remark became a punchline. 

At the trade deadline last year, Rivera was pushed to sell off defensive line pieces Montez Sweat and Chase Young, both former first-round picks of the organization. A year later, Peters found himself buying at the deadline and acquired former New Orleans Saints cornerback Marshon Lattimore, whose Commanders debut will have to wait at least another week as he continues to recover from a hamstring injury. 

“I don’t necessarily look at it as being a buyer or a seller,” said Peters, who had $96 million in cap space to work with this offseason and signed respected veterans (who have also been contributors) such as tight end Zach Ertz, running back Austin Ekeler, linebacker Frankie Luvu and linebacker Bobby Wagner. “I think just trying to do the best I can to help this team be as good as it can.”

Quinn defines culture as “how a group lives their life together.” For him, it’s in the standards – effort and physicality, for example – he has set.

“The things that we want to play with,” Quinn said after Washington’s 3-1 start. “Has it been all perfect? Hell no. But there is (sic) a lot of things that show how far people are in for one another. And those kinds of things go a long way to helping that identity come to shape.

“But it takes a while to fully go through that, and every time we’re playing, you just see that over and over. So yeah, we’re building that, but by no means in four games are we where we’re going to be two months from now.”

Another day, another historical game for Victor Wembanyama. The Spurs came into tonight’s match-up against the struggling Washington Wizards looking for their third win in four games during this five-game home stand, and while the second unit gave up a couple of double-digit leads in the first and fourth quarter, they were built on the back of Wemby’s red-hot shooting, and the Spurs were able to hold on down the stretch to secure the 139-130 win.

Wemby scored a career-high 50 points with the help of another career-high of 8 threes on 15 attempts, along with 6 rebounds and 3 blocks. His big night actually overshadowed a similarly big one from Jordan Poole, who had 42 points and led the Wizards in their last-ditch comeback attempt to keep the game interesting down to the final seconds.

Observations

• In case you missed it, the Spurs announced earlier in the day that the medical episode Gregg Popovich suffered back on November 2 ahead of the Timberwolves game was a mild stroke. He is now in a rehabilitation program and is expected to make a full recovery, but there is no timeline for him to return. Pop and his family remain in our thoughts and prayers, and hopefully he can return to the sideline again.
• Jonas Valanciunas continued his Spurs-killer ways, recording a double-double of 10 points and 11 rebounds in just 10 minutes of action in the first half alone. Fortunately, he never got going in the second half as the Spurs pulled away.
• Sometimes Box Score plus/minus doesn’t lie, and that was the case in the first half. All the starters had a plus/minus ranging from +9 to +17, while everyone off the bench had a negative, double-digit plus/minus except Blake Wesley, who was at 0. That certainly passed the eye test, as the Spurs built an early 16-point lead before almost instantly giving it back up when the bench came in for the first time, and the teams played pretty even from there to end up tied 67 all at halftime.
• Wembanyama is on an absolute tear in this home stand, and it continued today. He had 24 points by halftime and didn’t slow down in the second half. For the third game in a row, he matched his career high for threes in a game (6) early in the third quarter — only to soon break it with another. Even though he attempted 15 threes (maybe he will keep taking them and break the franchise record after all), he made 8 of them. The real test will come when the Spurs return to the road on Saturday, as his splits between home and the road are night and day.
• One thing the Spurs did not do well in this game was protect leads. They came out of the gate hot from three early to build a 16-point lead in the first quarter, but bench blew it almost entirely, and the lead was down to one at the end of the first quarter. The Wizards would eventually take a lead of three a few times before a huge 26-7 Spurs run to end the third quarter. The Spurs then built the lead all the way to 21 in the fourth, but once again the Wizards began to chip away once Mitch Johnson went the bench, and the starters had to return with five minutes left to close things out. Credit to the Wizards for not giving up.
• To end on something the Spurs did well that they haven’t in past games: protect the ball. They only had nine turnovers, conceding just 4 points off them. On the other hand, the Wizards had 18 turnovers, giving up 20 points off them to the Spurs. It turns out, the Spurs needed every bit of that difference tonight.

For the Wizards fans perspective, visit Bullets Forever.

The Spurs will conclude their home stand on Friday for the NBA Emirates Cup opener against the Los Angeles Lakers. Tip-off will be at 6:30 PM CT on ESPN.