This Quarterback Can Only Sit and Wait

Dylan Aquino fought back tears when he watched UCLA backup quarterback Steve Buck go down in Tucson because of back and arm injuries and starter Cade McNown go back into the game.

That could have been him, playing in his first college football game, instead of McNown. “The waiting is very difficult,” Aquino, a freshman, said of the evaluation process he is going through while doctors determine how best to attack a malformation of his brain stem that is cutting off the flow of fluid to his spinal column.

Surgery is indicated, but the affliction is so rare that doctors are still pondering how to proceed.

While he waits, Dylan Thomas Aquino goes to class and tries to emulate his namesake, the Welsh poet, sitting up nights with a black book in which he writes rhyme about the reason for his problems.

“It’s like they’ve given me answers, but with no answers,” he said of the doctors. “Everybody’s just waiting for answers.”

And Aquino waits for the verdict on his football future, along with childhood friend Roscoe Zamano, another UCLA freshman who suffered a knee injury in the Michigan game and is wondering if he will ever play football again.

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Linebacker Danjuan Magee is being held out of practice because of swelling in his left knee, though he says he will be able to play Saturday against USC.