Post BYU Discussion

[OSUCat]

First, Arizona is winning next week!

Game Management: Arizona is 7th in the Nation in Penalties! No stupid delay of games or substitution penalties.

OC: Play calling was good and even great some times. Fisch should avoid trying to get cute with the play calling. Calling plays back-to-back, the flea-flicker, etc. Biggest area that needs to improve (other than red zone) is 3rd down conversions (29% and 96th in the nation).

DC: So much better than the last decade! Arizona gave up 33.3% 3rd down conversions (47th in the nation). The two biggest mistakes was Barrs wasn't set for the 1st TD run (he was switching locations and got caught) and Malik being burned deep. Anyone else think it was strange that Brown called the timeout and not Fisch?

Special Teams: Lets not talk about the kicking game, but Cunningham will return more than one kick off for a TD.

Gunner Cruz: I mentioned this in the game thread. There was nothing that I saw from Cruz that was worse than any other Freshman QB Arizona has started in the past, not include QB run game. Holding onto the ball, making the wrong read, and taking a bad sack are all things that Arizona QBs have been bad at. I did see solid arm strength WITH touch. Cruz can make short, medium, and long throws. Cruz is the QB of the future and Noah Fifita can work on developing instead of being the next Freshman QB to thrown into the meat grinder.

TE: Still not used enough. Get these guys the ball!

Oline: Not as bad as I first thought. BYU sent 5 guys on many occasions that were picked up, other times it wasn't picked up. The biggest mistake came through the A Gap and I expect that will be addressed.

Overall: This team is light years ahead of last years team. Arizona is going to win the next two games!

[azcat49]

Agreed on all of it. More TE please. We gave up two TD’s on busted assignments. The four sacks were mostly on Cruz, should have thrown the ball away. Would have liked to run more but we were behind. Lots on straight north/south running and I thought with out speed we could get the edge a few times. Defense was great and who knows on Browns TO, we might have given up 6

[tgrumpy2]

Brown is the DC so if he saw something terrible in our defensive alignment I don't think it was a bit strange for him to call the timeout. I've been saying for sometime we are going to be a lot better than most people think and after last night I'm even more convinced of it. Field goal kicker needs to get his hear screwed on right, both of those misses were well within his range and snaps were good. Two more times we were in field goal range and sacks took us out of field goal range. I agree with OSU cat and those sacks were on Cruz not the OL. Cruz will grow and get a lot better as the season goes along. Yea more tight end.

[TheCatInTheHat]

From McCarran...

Nothing much to add on the game itself. Considering the new staff, new players, and a challenging environment, it's encouraging, and we'll improve more from playing BYU there than if we'd played NAU at home.

LV did a great job putting on the game in a terrific venue. Better than any of the 8 bowl games I've been to.

Hope the broadcast was positive and our fans respond well for SDSU.

If anybody cares, we easily won the battle of the band's. They looked better than about the last 30 year's, IMO, and BYU looked like a big high school.

Despite the loss, very glad I came.

[azcat49]

Just watch the second half and wow, we really gave that one away. Had first and 10 from the 12 and we decided three pass plays was the best call? Then on third down Cruz takes a terrible sack. He was just so indecisive on so many plays and yet he completed 30 balls for over 300 yards.

27 first downs and 7 straight drives in their territory and we only got 16 points. Work that out and we are on our way

[UAEebs86]

[azgreg]

Great news.

[Carcassdragger]

Great news. Thank you Lord.

[Merkin]

So glad!

Like my wife and I were saying when that happened, it really makes you realize what's important and what isn't.

[U.P. Zona Fan]

Never commented on football,

6 losses in the pac 12 in week 1?
Dude, that's horrible.
It wasn't like we were playing Florida, Wisconsin and oklahoma.

[azgreg]

Never commented on football,

6 losses in the pac 12 in week 1?
Dude, that's horrible.
It wasn't like we were playing Florida, Wisconsin and oklahoma.

Next week has the making for a bad week form the conference.

[AV8RCAT]

This team was in shards. Sumlinized without a reach around, and Fisch and co rebuilt it.
They've had a few months to adjust to an all new everything and they played tougher and looked more promising in losing than any of Stumblins did in winning.

[AzCatFan2]

Made some correctable mistakes that shouldn't be difficult to fix. Not setting the on D was a problem in the first half, but we did better in the second. Havrisik has a huge leg, and if/when he gains some confidence in his accuracy, he will be a very good kicker. Maybe great. His last FG attempt was his best. Cruz showed flashes as well, and his one pick was a mistake, but he was trying to make a play.

With that said, a few coaching errors as well. BYU played a bend but don't break D, and almost played it to perfection. Just one mistake on the TD. We need to do better against a blitz, and have confidence in Cruz that if he sees a blitz coming and we're lining up 5-wide, we either need to change formation or make sure we have a hot read. On D, we did a great job taking out the BYU TE's, and they weren't a factor but that allowed the RBs to be a bigger part of the offense catching the ball. Don't think we adjusted at all during the game.

Not a bad first game for Fisch, but not great either. The game was winnable, and we didn't win. At least we didn't give up like we did under Sumlin.

[Spaceman Spiff]

Made some correctable mistakes that shouldn't be difficult to fix. Not setting the on D was a problem in the first half, but we did better in the second. Havrisik has a huge leg, and if/when he gains some confidence in his accuracy, he will be a very good kicker. Maybe great. His last FG attempt was his best. Cruz showed flashes as well, and his one pick was a mistake, but he was trying to make a play.

With that said, a few coaching errors as well. BYU played a bend but don't break D, and almost played it to perfection. Just one mistake on the TD. We need to do better against a blitz, and have confidence in Cruz that if he sees a blitz coming and we're lining up 5-wide, we either need to change formation or make sure we have a hot read. On D, we did a great job taking out the BYU TE's, and they weren't a factor but that allowed the RBs to be a bigger part of the offense catching the ball. Don't think we adjusted at all during the game.

Not a bad first game for Fisch, but not great either. The game was winnable, and we didn't win. At least we didn't give up like we did under Sumlin.

I hated the way Fisch's hire went down, but I disagree with this a bit.

We have a ton of new guys who were playing their first game together and their first game in major roles. I think that necessitates a good amount of vanilla and not adjusting on the fly.

We had a talent disadvantage, as we will in most games. To that end, I think it's totally defensible to have a gameplan that doesn't require players to make a ton of reads. Especially Cruz, if we'd pushed him to make a lot of fast decisions in his first college game, things could have gone much worse.

I think we had the game plan we needed to have given our experience level and the sheer number of new pieces. Over the year, I expect more wrinkles, but for now, just executing the base is a good goal to reach, and I think we did that.

[AzCatFan2]

Made some correctable mistakes that shouldn't be difficult to fix. Not setting the on D was a problem in the first half, but we did better in the second. Havrisik has a huge leg, and if/when he gains some confidence in his accuracy, he will be a very good kicker. Maybe great. His last FG attempt was his best. Cruz showed flashes as well, and his one pick was a mistake, but he was trying to make a play.

With that said, a few coaching errors as well. BYU played a bend but don't break D, and almost played it to perfection. Just one mistake on the TD. We need to do better against a blitz, and have confidence in Cruz that if he sees a blitz coming and we're lining up 5-wide, we either need to change formation or make sure we have a hot read. On D, we did a great job taking out the BYU TE's, and they weren't a factor but that allowed the RBs to be a bigger part of the offense catching the ball. Don't think we adjusted at all during the game.

Not a bad first game for Fisch, but not great either. The game was winnable, and we didn't win. At least we didn't give up like we did under Sumlin.

I hated the way Fisch's hire went down, but I disagree with this a bit.

We have a ton of new guys who were playing their first game together and their first game in major roles. I think that necessitates a good amount of vanilla and not adjusting on the fly.

We had a talent disadvantage, as we will in most games. To that end, I think it's totally defensible to have a gameplan that doesn't require players to make a ton of reads. Especially Cruz, if we'd pushed him to make a lot of fast decisions in his first college game, things could have gone much worse.

I think we had the game plan we needed to have given our experience level and the sheer number of new pieces. Over the year, I expect more wrinkles, but for now, just executing the base is a good goal to reach, and I think we did that.

It was difficult to know how big the talent disparity would be with BYU. As you said, we had a lot of new players, and you can't use last year as any barometer for Arizona. The kids quit on Sumlin and played nowhere near to their potential. The phrase you are never as bad as you look when you lose comes to mind with the ASu beatdown. We weren't 63 points worse if we played up to our potential. Still not a better team, but not 63 points.

BYU also had a lot of new parts, including QB, and the fact we made the game winnable is a positive. We showed good fight and never gave up. But as you say, if we are to have such a slim margin for error, every error we do make is going to be magnified. And any way you slice it, we lost a game that we had a chance to win. Much better than saying the game was lost 30 seconds into it, but still, it's another loss. And one we might be lamenting if we end up going 5-7 and the BYU game is the difference between bowling and staying home.

We had a thousand mile journey was Fisch was hired, and we've taken some good first steps. Could have taken a huge one had we won. Let's take that next step this Saturday.