There’s no rest for the weary or the winning if you’re defending MEAC football champion North Carolina Central.
Fresh off a dominant second-half performance that gave them a 30-16 win over longtime rival North Carolina A&T, the Eagles will be West Coastin’ this weekend as they’ll take on UCLA, ranked 24 in the FBS polls, Saturday at 5 pm Eastern on the PAC-12 Network.
Eagles head coach Trei Oliver scheduled the Bruins for the purpose of challenging his team, and he plans to have his team well-prepared.
“Those guys are big, physical, fast and well-coached. Two first-round draft picks at defensive end and they’re a top-25 team,” Oliver said. “We have to start fast and give ourselves a chance. We have to win the middle eight minutes and get the game to the fourth quarter. We talked about doing the same things Winston needed to be successful against us.”
Central turned their defense loose on the Aggies last week, shutting out A&T for the entire second half while scoring runs from running back Latrell Collier and quarterback Davius Richard, giving the Eagles enough cushion for their first win at Truist Stadium since 2015. No matter where the game was played, Oliver wanted his guys ready for a fight.
“This win is different when you go to their place and knock them off,” he said. “It didn’t matter where we played those guys, we could’ve played on the moon. We just want you to put the ball down. It was a big win for our program and university. My first year in 2019, they got after us pretty good. We had to return that favor.”
Now that local debts have been repaid, the Eagles are out in LA to play a football game and showcase the North Carolina Central brand.
“We have a great alumni base out there who are very supportive and there are folks who are traveling out there as well,” Oliver said. “We’re going to spend some time with Ernie Barnes’ estate. He was a great artist, an NFL draft pick and of course a North Carolina Central alum. We’re very excited to let our guys see some things culturally.”
UCLA will pose a challenge to Central’s winning ways, but according to Oliver, that’s the point.
“You know what you’re going to get when you play these teams. We put this game on the schedule for us to get tested,” he says. “We’ve had 28 NFL teams come in to evaluate our guys. They want to see our guys against D-1 talent, so It’ll be a test for us and we’ve got to come up with a great game plan to slow these guys down.”
