With half of the regular season in the rear-view mirror, the Bruins continue to reel in the hardware.
The Associated Press released its Pac-12 midseason awards Friday morning, and No. 11 UCLA football (6-0, 3-0 Pac-12) was well-represented on the list of honorees compiled by AP writers who cover the conference. Quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson was named the Pac-12's Top Offensive Player, while Chip Kelly was named its Top Coach.
UCLA was also named Most Surprising Team, which is fitting since the Bruins did not crack the preseason top 40 and did not have a single vote in the AP Poll even as recently as Week 4.
UCLA is coming off of back-to-back upset wins over ranked teams, first beating then-No. 15 Washington on Sept. 30 and then taking care of then-No. 11 Utah on Oct. 8.
Thompson-Robinson was a major part of both victories, fueling the offense with 675 yards and nine total touchdowns across the two games. His completion percentage was 75% and his passer rating was 204.8 in the two nationally televised contests, putting him on many pundits' radars for the Heisman Trophy in the process.
Just in the past two weeks, Thompson-Robinson has been named Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week twice, the Rose Bowl Game's Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Week twice, Davey O'Brien National Quarterback of the Week once and Maxwell Award Player of the Week once.
Through six games, Thompson-Robinson has thrown for 1,510 yards, 15 touchdowns and two interceptions on 74.8% completion with a 180.6 passer rating while also rushing for 231 yards and four touchdowns. His passer rating, completion percentage and adjusted yards per attempt are all No. 1 in the conference, and his passer rating is on pace to be the highest by a Pac-12 quarterback since Marcus Mariota won the Heisman in 2014.
Thompson-Robinson recently became UCLA's all-time career leader in touchdown passes with 76. The fifth-year starter needs just 11 combined rushing or passing scores to surpass Brett Hundley for most career total touchdowns in program history, and he needs 1,266 total yards to take the No. 1 spot on that list from Hundley as well.
As for Kelly, his record through three years in Westwood was sitting at 10-21. UCLA went 8-4 in 2021 to start to turn the ship around, although none of the wins came against teams with winning records, positioning 2022 as a critical campaign for the overall narrative of his tenure.
The Bruins are now 6-0 for the first time since 2005, and a win over No. 12 Oregon in Eugene on Oct. 22 would likely bump the program into the top 10 for the first time in nearly a decade.
UCLA played in two Pac-12 championship games back in 2011 and 2012, but one of those was thanks to USC's postseason ban. In both cases, the Bruins would not have made it to the conference title game under the new rules that take divisions out of the equation in regards to deciding participants.
As the second-highest ranked Pac-12 team in the most recent AP Poll and the current No. 1 team in the Sports Illustrated Pac-12 Power Rankings, the Bruins are in position to actually earn a trip to Las Vegas in early December, despite being picked to finish in a distant fourth to start the year.
UCLA has not had a Pac-12 Offensive Player of the Year winner since quarterback Cade McNown in 1998, and it hasn't had a Pac-12 Coach of the Year since 2005. The Bruins have not won the conference outright since 1998.
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Sam Connon is the Publisher and Managing Editor at All Bruins, in association with the FanNation and Sports Illustrated networks.