‘Win, lose, or get beat’: UCLA turning small details into big results under Bob Chesney
Connor Moreno
Host · Writer
LOS ANGELES – Rarely does UCLA offensive lineman Julian Armella sit back and put his approach to football in perspective, but one of first-year head coach Bob Chesney’s signature phrases did just that: “You either win, lose, or get beat.”
“The first time I heard it, it was kind of eye-opening for me,” Armella told The Sporting Tribune. “When he explained to us that we weren’t going to lose any games, I was thinking in my head, ‘What does that mean?’”
The phrase itself was new to many of the returning UCLA players, but for those who followed Chesney from James Madison, it’s been something to live by. A smile came to defensive lineman Sahir West’s face when he heard the line, as if it’d been engrained in his brain.
“He’s always said that,” Chesney’s breakout defensive lineman said Wednesday.”That’s who he truly is. I’ve heard that from the first day I was a freshman. He said he will not lose games. Either a team is gonna beat you, you lose the game, or you win. It’s a great saying. It puts into perspective that you gotta go all in.”
The explanation is quite simple, according to senior running back Jaivian Thomas: If you work as a team, focus on the small details and play as a team, you win. If you do all of that and the opposing team happens to be better than you, you lose. But, detract from all of those things and lose control of the controllables, you get beat.
That collective mindset and culture is what led Chesney and the Dukes to a 12-2 season and College Football Playoff berth. It’s an overarching theme of the culture shift in Westwood ahead of the 2026 season.
Keying in on the small details has been a theme of Chesney’s early tenure at UCLA. From spending time on fumble recovery techniques and punt return alignment on the field, to putting posters in the locker rooms that show pictures and names of the equipment staff, janitors and kitchen workers off the field. It’s a discipline that’s been instilled up and down the program.
“The small stuff really plays a part,” said returning senior wide receiver Mikey Matthews. “Like even just keeping your locker room clean. Coach Chesney says something like, ‘If you can’t keep your locker room clean, what’s gonna stop you from jumping offsides on 4th and 1?’ If you can’t focus on the little things then you can’t paint the bigger picture … the minute details and everything like that definitely plays a part and it separates you from being good and great.”
That’s the bridge Chesney and his staff are trying to create, the difference between being a good football team – or in UCLA’s case last season, a bad team – and being a great one.
Chesney and his staff have their work cut out for them, though. Balancing a jump to a more talented conference, extreme roster turnover (63 new players) and the expectations that are placed on UCLA athletics in general is a lot of weight to bear. But the Bruins are bearing it as one team.
Armella added, “when it comes to a pack of lions, you always see them in a straight and narrow line. They’ve always got the pack leader and everybody’s walking straight. They know what they’re doing. They’re gonna go hunt, they’re gonna do exactly what they need to do to survive and get things done.
“But then you look at a pack of sheep and you got one sheep that’s over here on the floor laying in the sun, and the other one’s licking himself, the other one’s playing with another sheep. At the end of the day, if you have a bunch of sheep instead of lions, you’re gonna be losing.”
