LOS ANGELES — Kenny Churchwell III gazed at the turf, trying to find the words, his hands working faster than the muscles in his mouth.
Last year, UCLA football's hopes in the Pac-12 were crushed under an unrelenting air raid, Oregon's Bo Nix and USC's Caleb Williams and Arizona's Jayden De Laura all too often firing into windows too wide and secondaries too shaky. Chip Kelly's offensive juggernaut and Dorian Thompson-Robinson's development couldn't save defensive coverages that collapsed.
"We're trying to promote a different standard," junior safety Churchwell asserted at spring practice Tuesday. And then he paused, trying to quantify a platitude his tone indicated was of the utmost importance.
