All week – at least on the radio show – the question was: just how good is the Arizona football team?
Kinda good?
Good?
Real good?
Is there something in between all that?
We know it’s much better than Northern Arizona, Northern Illinois and Washington State … as it should be. And it can stay competitive with a ranked Brigham Young. So, after Saturday night’s 34-7 convincing win over Cincinnati it’s closer to real good than any other.
Still, it’s not likely in the top 25 – not that that matters.
Arizona is now 4-1, just like last year when it went on that surprisingly (at least it felt that way) run to the Holiday Bowl. This year, it’s anyone’s guess where UA will land, but so far so good – well, real good.
Saturday, Noah Fifita was surgeon-like on a night when targets were falling left and right (more later). He was dodging and weaving – except for that first play of the game and maybe another – through UA’s backfield, finding backup receivers at will.
“That’s one of his superpowers, is his ability to throw the ball accurately on the move,” UA coach Brent Brennan said. “It really is, and you saw that show up a bunch. But I think we’ve seen it show up before, too. I’ll tell you guys every day, twice a day, if you want to hear it. I’m so glad Noah Fifita plays for Arizona.”
He finished with 284 passing yards and two touchdowns. He hit 25 of 37 passes. And, he had a rushing touchdown.
Arizona had 238 rushing yards, the most in four seasons.
The defense wasn’t overshadowed. Danny Gonzales’ attack kept Cincinnati to 74 rushing yards, nearly 200 fewer than its average. Heck, had it not been for a last-minute drive, Arizona would have had its first shutout in 13 years.
“Lights out,” Brennan said of the defense. “They wanted to run the ball. We knew that, and we said ‘no.’ We’re not going to do that tonight. And that’s just a commitment and a mentality from the defensive staff and defensive players, and I thought that was awesome.
The effort – on both sides – led Arizona to one of its more impressive home wins in some time – at least start to finish, even if UA held just a 10-0 advantage at halftime. The beating continued in the second half.
Who would have thought Arizona would stomp on Cincinnati by that much? Again, it was methodical, so much so Arizona, despite a 27-0 lead, didn’t let up in the final minutes of the game as it went for yet another touchdown with the game over.
Style points? Why not?
Does it really matter?
Still, what Arizona did – behind Seth Doege – was open the playbook a little bit more to prove they do have some bit to them.
“We (went) in this game knowing that we needed to run the football, and had some ups and downs trying to do that the last month of the season,” Brennan said. “I thought (offensive line) coach (Josh) Oglesby put together a great plan for running the football, and I thought coach Doege called a great game. And the combination of the physicality of our offensive line and just the running backs, running with some real violence, made that stuff a lot of fun to watch.”
It’s always fun when you win. Saturday, it was all that, save for some key – crucial? – injuries UA sustained in the game.
Receivers Gio Richardson, who returned from an earlier injury, left with what was another injury, Chris Hunter and Tre Spivey got hurt in the first half.
Yikes! Well, maybe not.
“I thought they did a great job,” Brennan said of the reserves. “I think that’s one of those things you can’t plan for. I feel for those young men that got banged up because they’re such big parts of our team. But we also know that all season we’ve been talking about the depth of the receiver room, and that’s going to be super, super critical now as we move forward. And those young players are ready to play, and I think that part of it, Bobby (Wade) has done a great job of building that room. And so now the next part of our process is like kind of tailoring some of the scheme to what they do best.”
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