3 Things Already Standing Out About UCLA's Week 4 East Coast Trip

UCLA will make its way to Maryland during Week 4 of the upcoming college football season, continuing the early portion of its Big Ten slate against the Terrapins in College Park.

It's not a matchup with much history, having only been played three times, but it still provides a great opportunity for the Bruins in 2026.

1. East Coast Trip

UCLA doesn't make many East Coast trips in football, but joining the Big Ten was obviously going to increase that based on the locations of the rest of its members. This game will be UCLA's first Eastern trip since its debut season in the conference in 2024, when the Bruins traveled to Rutgers.

It was the first-ever meeting between the two programs, ending with a 35-32 victory for the Bruins after an impressive performance from redshirt senior quarterback Ethan Garbers. Whereas the basketball program's struggles with games outside the Pacific Time Zone have been well documented, the football program has actually fared decently well.

Not only did UCLA win its only other trip to the East Coast since joining the Big Ten, but they've won three times outside their own time zone over the last two years. A 3-5 mark in such games isn't particularly daunting, but it should be enough to add confidence to this trip.

2. Easing Into Conference Play

While UCLA jumps into conference play a little early with its Week 3 game against Purdue, the Bruins couldn't have drawn up a better start to their Big Ten football schedule -- on paper at least. Purdue has not won a Big Ten game in more than two years, losing its last 18 and clearly holding the conference's worst mark in that span.

Maryland is the next worst with a 2-16 record during that time (back-to-back 1-8 seasons), and the Terrapins were one of UCLA's few victims last fall. With no real changes on the opposing side, even with this being a coast-to-coast road game for UCLA, things are falling apart quickly in College Park, creating a potentially perfect storm for the Bruins in a foundational year.

3. Chesney's (Sort of) Homecoming

We all know Bob Chesney has East Coast roots, and the move to UCLA brought him into unfamiliar territory, but the game against Maryland should make him feel somewhat at home. Not only is he an East Coast guy, but he spent four seasons on the staff at Johns Hopkins (Baltimore), which is only about 32 miles from College Park.

He served primarily as a special teams and defensive backs coach for the Blue Jays, but quickly made his way into the defensive coordinator and associate head coach positions before making head coaching stops throughout New England.

So, while he's not exactly returning to face any of the institutions he previously led, he should be well aware of the atmosphere and conditions and have some kind of added motivation to make those watching proud.

This article was originally published on www.si.com/college/ucla as 3 Things Already Standing Out About UCLA's Week 4 East Coast Trip.

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This story was originally published May 24, 2026 at 7:00 AM.