Pac-10 media day: UCLA's Neuheisel says conference better than perceived

UCLA Coach Rick Neuheisel says the Pac-10 conference is trying to improve its national image, though he sees plenty of work to be done in that area.

“We’ve been the left-coast conference and perceived as a finesse conference for years. You get into conversations with somebody east of the Mississippi River and they’ll tell you, ‘You play that throwing-the-ball-around football, not the three-yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust tough-guy stuff.’ ”

But Neuheisel said, “I have coached in the NFL, and there is plenty of Pac-10 representation at that level. There is no reason our conference shouldn’t be held up there. A lot of it is perception.”

--Chris Foster
twitter.com/cfosterlatimes