The Berkeley-to-Westwood connection is humming.
Burl toler III, from Berkeley who represents the third generation of his university football family, has spent the last seven seasons to help CAL.
He is the new coach of the UCLA wide receiver, as well as its gaming coordinator and recruitment coordinator, the last of a golden bear line in Bruins like the former secondaryer Oluwafemi Oldojo, who is preparing for the draft of the NFL, and the external recipient J.Michael Sturdivant, who has since transferred to Florida.
Shortly after Toler joined the Bruins, Mikey Matthews, who played the CAL receiver to tolerate during the 2024 season, landed at the UCLA via the transfer portal.
“He is a great coach. He is very kind, and he is a great human. … He teaches me to be a better man. He is always bigger than football,” said Matthews about toler.
Admiration is mutual.
“He brings leadership and motivation. He brings energy. He is a starter of fires,” said Burl about Matthews. “There is another coach in the room for me.”
A few days following the fact that Matthews struck the transfer portal, the coach knew that he had to act quickly.
“Immediately, I experienced its impact in the room and I saw that we needed someone to change the culture at the UCLA and a light a fire here,” said Burl. “He wants to go winning matches.”
Matthews, in his third school in three years, has taken 32 receptions for 272 yards and a hit in Cal last fall. He added seven races for 29 yards on the ground, and he accumulated 67 yards with a release of clearance.
He spent the 2023 season at UTAH, accumulating 29 receptions for 261 yards with tasks back from kicking and clearance. From the slot machines receiver to a covers of a booty shot to the ball carrier, Matthews wants to have a big impact with the Bruins, whatever the position.
“I always wanted to go out at the UCLA in the school,” said Matthews. “I took a different route, but now I’m here. I am excited for the season. “
He does not waste time. Matthews said he had received the game book in mid-March. “I stay above every day,” he said.
Matthews wants to complete his friend and teammate Kwazi Gilmer (“It’s my dog,” said Matthews about Gilmer), who started the last five games of his first year while displaying 31 receptions for 345 yards and two affected in a promising campaign in 2024.
Toler, who played university football with the quarter Aaron Rodgers over 20 years ago in Cal, hopes that his enthusiasm and his ability to motivate will encourage Bruins to large heights this fall. He would not put a name on his offense.
“” Dispute for defense “is the way I call it,” he said. “We want to put the guys in the right place. We challenge them a lot and challenge us a lot. ”
Toler is perhaps the busiest man in Westwood with the recruitment wars, but he understands that it will take a whole network of coaches and colleagues to bring the best football players to Westwood.
“It’s all hands on the bridge,” said toler.
Bruins bring energy
On the other side of a corridor where the donuts snuggled in boxes and the coffee cooked on a folding table, the second year chief coach Deshaun Foster has quietly put up on a podium in a cavernous room in the depths of the Wasserman football center.
The coach put on a “42” black hat – a tribute to the legendary pioneer and the Bruins Great Jackie Robinson – and a black UCLA hooded sweatshirt with the eponymous resemblance of Michael Jordan, the famous “Jumpman” logo.
Foster is from the Teddy Roosevelt School of Football: speak slowly and wear a big stick, or at least a heavy game book.
He succinctly answered a handful of questions from the press body before returning to the two training areas near the heart of the UCLA campus.
“The energy level was there,” said Foster quietly before Thursday morning training, the fifth of the team during this spring session.
The Bruins work hard to erase the memory of the global record of 5-7 from last year, including 3-6 in the Big Ten conference.
Bill Cowher once moved NFL films that he would like 75 degrees and Sunshine all the time, but it is not football – does not say it to Bruins.
Eighty-three students at the UCLA hit the ground with a magnificent morning in Los Angeles while hip-hop music sounds on speakers. Jay-Z struck “Bring them!” The hammered eardrums, and on the signal and in rhythm of the song, the Bruins scolded towards the next station.
“We work!” We work! ” An assistant coach yelled to players from the race for the station.
“Yes sir!” A bruin responded.
Seven-quarter-rear in turn in the training of Thursday. The Hopes of Gunsling are Henry Hasselbeck, Nick Biloups, Robert McDaniel, Colton Gumino, Joey Aguilar, Luke Duncan and Dermaricus Davis.
Practice was a more sifted affair for injured bruins. The wide receiver Titus Mokiao-Atimalala, the winger tight Hudson Habermehl, the offensive line Marquise Thorpe Taylor and the defensive line Keanu Williams have crossed the meticulous exercises far from their teammates, at least during the first 30 minutes of practice open to the media.
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