2024 Season Thread

[PHXCATS]

Seating does not need to decrease. It had already happened and will when seats go on the west side

Tucson need to pick it up. Weak ass attendance

Tucson does not deserve a winner if they continue to not support the program

[ChooChooCat]

Seating does not need to decrease. It had already happened and will when seats go on the west side

Tucson need to pick it up. Weak ass attendance

Tucson does not deserve a winner if they continue to not support the program

If it's never filled, guess what? It needs to decrease. Talk shit about Tucson all you want, but if 50,000 Tucsonans don't turn out for the program there's only one way to not look like shit and make money.

[Carcassdragger]

Seating does not need to decrease. It had already happened and will when seats go on the west side

Tucson need to pick it up. Weak ass attendance

Tucson does not deserve a winner if they continue to not support the program

If it's never filled, guess what? It needs to decrease. Talk shit about Tucson all you want, but if 50,000 Tucsonans don't turn out for the program there's only one way to not look like shit and make money.

Win?

[PHXCATS]

Seating does not need to decrease. It had already happened and will when seats go on the west side

Tucson need to pick it up. Weak ass attendance

Tucson does not deserve a winner if they continue to not support the program

If it's never filled, guess what? It needs to decrease. Talk shit about Tucson all you want, but if 50,000 Tucsonans don't turn out for the program there's only one way to not look like shit and make money.

Win?

Team wins and Tucson doesn't show up

[ChooChooCat]

Seating does not need to decrease. It had already happened and will when seats go on the west side

Tucson need to pick it up. Weak ass attendance

Tucson does not deserve a winner if they continue to not support the program

If it's never filled, guess what? It needs to decrease. Talk shit about Tucson all you want, but if 50,000 Tucsonans don't turn out for the program there's only one way to not look like shit and make money.

Win?

Something we don't do consistently ever. Even when we do win we pretty much lose immediately afterwards, so the culture can literally never be built and is immediately sabotaged by our own ineptitude. This is Arizona Football.

[Merkin]

Cats are oh-fer in winning sole conference football championships in both the WAC and PAC eras, and doubt I will see one in my lifetime in the B12. Right ECC?

How many programs can say that?

Tucson just has low expectations hence low excitement for the program.

[pc in NM]

Cats are oh-fer in winning sole conference football championships in both the WAC and PAC eras, and doubt I will see one in my lifetime in the B12. Right ECC?

How many programs can say that?

Tucson just has low expectations hence low excitement for the program.

I think it would be more accurate to say that Tucson has low interest, win or lose....

[IrishAzCat]

[TheCatInTheHat]

Choo said it far better than I could. Biggest difference to me is that last year Noah was able to get the ball out quick and keep defenses on their heels. This year the routes all seem to take 6+ seconds and Noah is either running for his life or throwing to guys who are covered. We aren’t catching anyone by surprise with anything we are doing. That’s a big damn problem.

I read an analysis of the offense yesterday, and wish I would have shared it but didn't really understand it.

The gist was last season was 1,2,3 ball out with a lot of play action and short over the middle throws. Now it's 4,5,6 ball out. The running plays are extremely slow developing. Times you see a handoff to a running back that is not moving.

The grandfather of UA social media sites has a lot to say on that.

https://x.com/WSRBrad


Although I am not really sure why Fifita can't see open receivers now and if he does he misses them. I know he's shorter than the average QB, but he saw them fine last season. T-Mac also seems banged up. A step slow and trying to one hand catches.

Agree with all this. While some can't get enough of 'the Big XII is a terrible truck stop' analogy, a tiny bit of respect should go to league-leading 5-1 Texas Tech. But, I flew in for the game, and we did look like shit. Somebody mentioned a series of bad breaks, but it really seems like poorly disciplined teams always get more of those. For example, the penalty for the players crowding out onto the field is directly on the coaching staff. Adkins (to the extent he has any autonomy) needs to cut back the slow wide running plays and probably a few less home run balls. I'm pretty sure Brennan gets directly involved in some of that. Everybody hates him for good reason, but Fisch (granted with more receiver talent) tailored his offense to Fifita on the fly, which no doubt included throwing lanes for a short QB. In any event, people are certainly free to vent, and those who wish we were more like Gonzaga or Creighton or Marquette, unburdened by a struggling football team, can dream on, but football's been shown to be the driver in the conference realignment and media wars, and we'll have a game at BYU Saturday regardless.

[azcat49]

Just been sick since the end of the game. Signature AZ win at Utah putting us in the drivers seat.

Come home and national freshman of the year gets picked before half and they score. Our NFL level All American kicker misses a 29 yard FG to give them a chance and our All American WR gets stripped basically ending the game.

If that isn’t a microcosm of the history of AZ football in one game, I don’t what is. SMDH

[Fishclamps]

Choo said it far better than I could. Biggest difference to me is that last year Noah was able to get the ball out quick and keep defenses on their heels. This year the routes all seem to take 6+ seconds and Noah is either running for his life or throwing to guys who are covered. We aren’t catching anyone by surprise with anything we are doing. That’s a big damn problem.

I read an analysis of the offense yesterday, and wish I would have shared it but didn't really understand it.

The gist was last season was 1,2,3 ball out with a lot of play action and short over the middle throws. Now it's 4,5,6 ball out. The running plays are extremely slow developing. Times you see a handoff to a running back that is not moving.

The grandfather of UA social media sites has a lot to say on that.

https://x.com/WSRBrad


Although I am not really sure why Fifita can't see open receivers now and if he does he misses them. I know he's shorter than the average QB, but he saw them fine last season. T-Mac also seems banged up. A step slow and trying to one hand catches.

The argument for him not seeing the field is that hes playing mostly under center this season so hes already having his view blocked before he even snaps the ball, and then the line is moving as he moves back so he doesnt have the windows to see through like he would if he was taking snaps from shotgun.

[TheCatInTheHat]

I put some of this on coaches trying to establish the ground game, maybe at a higher level of football than they're used to. It's always a great idea...if you've got the linemen and backs to pull it off and you can balance it with a decent passing attack. But, in my history of watching Arizona football, we've really never had any kind of power running game. Jim Young's "1-2-3 Backfield" was the veer with brush-blocking against WAC defenses. Tony Mason ran a power option that tried, but a lot of the time it was running into brick walls. After the early Steve Axman stuff, Larry Smith pounded his undersized backs with TE Alfred Jenkins at QB. In the middle of his term at Arizona, Tomey had the "Back Attack", which was modified or true wishbone brush-blocking. RichRod ran his QBs until concussed. Until proven otherwise, the most successful strategy over time at UofA against better teams would seem to be to pass to set up the run.

[Merkin]

Pretty much what we have all noticed.

[azgreg]

Reports are Stukes is out for the year.

[ChooChooCat]

Reports are Stukes is out for the year.

Gunner likely is too.

[Chicat]

Are we having fun yet?

[Fishclamps]

Good thing our db room was the deepest part of the team.

[UAEebs86]

FML

[PHXCATS]

Bear Down

Know what it means

[Merkin]

Not necessarily agreeing with this, but this is Arizona football.

Reports are Stukes is out for the year.

[AZCatGirl]

The news just gets better...

[PHXCATS]

Please remember what bear down means

[Postmaster]

I write this post with a heavy heart. I really wanted the Brennan Experiment to work, I really did. I held back on my initial impressions on the coaching staff until I watched them play the first two games, after which it became readily apparent that we are simply not built to compete at a high level.

...

I caution against sweeping conclusions after a loss, especially a loss followed by a truly great road performance Vs a 10th ranked Utah. But the high/low quality of the past two weeks is how I figured our season would go - strong enough to win any game on the schedule but inconsistent enough to lose most any game on the schedule.

We should've beat Texas Tech. But nothing went right for Arizona to start the game - for example getting stuffed on 4th&1 deep on TT's side of the field. And before we knew it Arizona was in an 18-3 hole. Then we fought back for a brief lead before, again, nothing went right - the fumble that resulted in a quick TT touchdown to put Arizona behind 28-19. Texas Tech is not as good as their 4-1 record shows, with more often than not ugly performances (Vs Abilene Christian, Washington State, and Cincinnati).

The rest of the way is impossible to predict, and for as lukewarm as the Big 12 is, with no immovable objects, we've drawn the hardest matches according to rankings/records - with Kansas St (non-C), Utah, and Texas Tech all 4-1. Arizona's next two are BYU at 5-0 and Colorado at 4-1. We've missed out on the lighter fare of Cincinnati, Houston, TCU, Baylor, and Kansas. Lot's of deadweight in the Big 12.

Catsby, you know what sparked that whole diatribe about Brennan? It's an unspoken rule among sportsmen that you never show up your opponent. You respect the game and your opponent by your conduct on the field. In the first half I watched Texas Tech go for a two point conversion when there was no reason to do so. It was a display of dominance and lack of respect for our team. I haven't heard one person on this board or any other speak on this, but that put me over the edge.

You remember the Kadeem timeout and how the fanbase got behind Miller? What about when Wazzu tried to do the same thing last year in Pullman and Fisch stuffed the two point conversion and we proceeded to score 44 unanswered points? We sent a message, crushed the Cougs spirits and destroyed their season (at least in my mind). Now when you have Batman, Wolverine and the Green Lantern on your team (our first rounders), you have no excuse to get embarrassed like that. That told me everything I needed to know about what kind of leader we had. There's no way on earth a coach should allow that to happen. After watching that kind of display, I would leave at halftime too like some of the other fans.

You know how many fans keep saying that we suffered major losses in terms of players and we should lower our expectations? Too many to count. You know who also suffered a lot of losses before taking the helm? Tommy Lloyd. We lost Akinjo (first team Pac) Terrell Brown (future Pac scoring leader) Jordan Brown (Pac 6th man) and Batcho (defensive swiss army knife). We still had talent, but no one expected us to make any waves or to field a super competitive team. All we got in return was Larsson, Ballo and Kier. What did Lloyd do? He quickly proved his worth and installed a new scheme, developed players and got us ranked before we hit conference play. He then proceeded to win the conference title, tournament title, secure a number 1 seed and make the sweet sixteen. No one had us being ranked before the season started. We were ranked and now we look unfocused and ragged. Tommy never complained about not having 'his guys' in order to win. He just simply did what good coaches do: perform.

The TT cheerleader guy would take their big flag, cross the field and stand in front of our band and cheerleaders and wave the flag after every score.

[azgreg]

Please remember what bear down means

Please remember what twat means.

[PHXCATS]

The hypocrisy knows no bounds

[Fishclamps]

[AZCatGirl]

If we can just figure out how to beat Colorado and ASU I'll be happy.

A small bowl would be great too, but I don't feel confident about that.

[scumdevils86]

We're averaging 17.4 PPG total since New Mexico. Half of that is from Loop. The rest of our offense is averaging 8.8 PPG.

[Fishclamps]

Well after this BYU game I can not be bothered to care about this team anymore. You go from that first drive TD doing the things we all wanted to see to then just going back to the same old shitty playbook we've seen all season.

I am absolutely dreading the ASU game now.

[Merkin]

24 points off turnovers for BYU.

UA also had 3 TOs v. TTech.

Turnover machine Matt Scott had 14 picks in 2012, but had 27 passing TDs to go along with that.

Fifita with 2 straight multi-turnover games. Will he break Matt Scott's 4 pick game v. ASU?

I know the OL is terrible, but they really need to get the ball out of there quicker, and Fifita needs to quit retreating 15 yards behind the LOS.

[PHXCATS]

What a pathetic fanbase

[AZCatGirl]

What a pathetic fanbase

Because we can admit our team is bad? Really?

[PHXCATS]

What a pathetic fanbase

Because we can admit our team is bad? Really?

They aren't that bad but no

For giving up

For being losers

[Merkin]

We're still here Machina.

[Chicat]

What a pathetic fanbase

Because we can admit our team is bad? Really?

They aren't that bad but no

For giving up

For being losers

Do you feel better now that you’ve had your little tantrum? Poor baby.

[TheCatInTheHat]

This is just turning startlingly and unexpectedly bad. Brennan seems like a good politician with the friendly and sympathetic demeanor and all of the ties and public references to Tomey. But, while he was handed some decent cards, he seems to have a little of that Ben Lindsey "I've got three years to build my program, so I'll shrug my way through the initial losses" with a bit of a cavalier attitude. We're halfway through the season, and the solitary "signature" win has been sullied. Maybe he can squeeze out three wins (including ASU), limp into a bad bowl game and win it. Otherwise, it will be a flat-out failed year where continuity and some level of carrying over momentum from last season was not an unreasonable expectation. Nothing to do but wait and see and ride it out, but it looks like any honeymoon's over only halfway through the trip.

[RawleArenas]

I didn't have anything personal with Brennan, but I do now. I think it's selfish to put yourself out there as the savior/good guy, when in reality the move was good for him, but not for Arizona and its fans. He pulled an end around and tried to get the fanbase on his side, while pulling the same stuff that gave him losing records at SJSU. Unfortunately, its gonna backfire badly, if it hasn't already.

[PHXCATS]

I didn't have anything personal with Brennan, but I do now. I think it's selfish to put yourself out there as the savior/good guy, when in reality the move was good for him, but not for Arizona and its fans. He pulled an end around and tried to get the fanbase on his side, while pulling the same stuff that gave him losing records at SJSU. Unfortunately, its gonna backfire badly, if it hasn't already.

What move exactly?

[CalStateTempe]

Brennens a loser, failed at SJSU, and will/has failed here.

But it let the OGs feel good for a little while.

This team is poorly coached trash.

[AZarchery]

Been five games with a new staff

Every needs to chill. Things will be fine

BYU only favored by 3. Vegas knows more than anyone here

We’re 1-4 against the spread this year with that one cover coming against a fluke of a Utah game. If Vegas truly knows more than anyone here, vegas is telling us this coaching staff underperforming big time.

BYU -3.5 is a farm bet.

Betting against this team has been a money maker.

[PHXCATS]

Brennens a loser, failed at SJSU, and will/has failed here.

But it let the OGs feel good for a little while.

This team is poorly coached trash.

Townie doesn't know ball

Townie won't write a check

Don't be townie

[AZCatGirl]

Writing a check wont solve anything unless someone has $10 million lying around.

[Merkin]

[CalStateTempe]

Brennens a loser, failed at SJSU, and will/has failed here.

But it let the OGs feel good for a little while.

This team is poorly coached trash.

Townie doesn't know ball

Townie won't write a check

Don't be townie

I don’t think you know the definition of the word townie as someone who has loudly proclaimed their love for Arcadia sports barz sky harbor Phoenix is the pinnacle of western civilian while shouting down all informed criticism of team with “bad fan rants”

Put a sock in it “townie”. This team is as mediocre and pedestrian as your posts here.

[CalStateTempe]

We are hot garbage. Can’t wait till Brennen is fired. Gonna have to wait a long time.

[Macho Grande]

Been five games with a new staff

Every needs to chill. Things will be fine

BYU only favored by 3. Vegas knows more than anyone here

We’re 1-4 against the spread this year with that one cover coming against a fluke of a Utah game. If Vegas truly knows more than anyone here, vegas is telling us this coaching staff underperforming big time.

BYU -3.5 is a farm bet.

Betting against this team has been a money maker.

Colorado +3.5 also looks like a farm bet.

[Carcassdragger]

Seems we're right where i thought we'd be next year. Pretty crappy.

Thing is, I thought it would take a year to be this bad until we lost this group of players.

Arizona football is at the point that we almost always are: a non factor and hoping to rise to mediocrity.

[Merkin]

PFF scores from the BYU game.

https://www.azdesertswarm.com/football/ ... big12-2024

Noah Fifita had the worst game of his career according to Pro Football Focus, which still gave Arizona good grades in some areas in the loss at BYU

Offense
RT Jonah Savaiinaea (87, 73.8)
C Josh Baker (87, 65.9)
LG Wendell Moe (87, 65.4)
RG Alexander Doost (87, 59.8)
LT Rhino Tapa’atoutai (87, 53.5)
QB Noah Fifita (87, 46.1)
WR Tetairoa McMillan (79, 62.7)
RB Quali Conley (60, 59.6)
WR Montana Lemonious-Craig (56, 57.4)
TE Sam Olson (45, 51.1)
TE Keyan Burnett (42, 64.4)
WR Jeremiah Patterson (40, 61.3)
WR Chris Hunter (27, 53.0)
RB Kedrick Reescano (26, 69.4)
TE Roberto Miranda (23, 60.1)
WR Devin Hyatt (16, 54.6)
WR Reymello Murphy (10, 85.2)
FB Kayden Luke (7, 72.1)
OL Joey Capra (4, 59.8)

Defense
S Genesis Smith (61, 68.5)
LB Taye Brown (61, 46.3)
S Dalton Johnson (61, 42.4)
LB Kamuela Ka’aihue (57, 61.9)
CB Emmanuel Karnley (54, 58.3)
CB Owen Goss (53, 60.4)
DT Ta’ita’i Uiagalelei (41, 68.3)
DE Tre Smith (41, 61.7)
DT Stanley Ta’ufo’ou (35, 65.4)
DE Dominic Lolesio (28, 65.8)
DE Sterling Lane II (27, 58.5)
CB Tacario Davis (26, 67.6)
DE Chase Kennedy (23, 37.6)
CB Marquis Groves-Killebrew (21, 62.0)
CB Demetrius Freeney (21, 60.9)
DT Isaiah Johnson (20, 64.6)
DT Kevon Darton (20, 61.8)
DE Lance Keneley (9, 64.5)
S Jack Luttrell (8, 64.9)
LB Jacob Manu (4, 42.8)

Highest-graded offensive starter: Savaiinaea (73.8)

Highest-graded defensive starter: G Smith (68.5)

Lowest-graded offensive starter: Fifita (46.1)

Lowest-graded defensive starter: Manu (42.8)

Highest-graded subs: Murphy (85.2), Luke (72.1), Reescano (69.4), Lolesio (65.8)

Top pass blocker: Baker (87.5)

Top run blocker: Burnett (75.9)

Top run defender: Uiagalelei (75.2)

Top pass rusher: Ta’ufo’ou (66.6)

Top tackler: Ka’aihue (80.0)

Top pass coverage: G Smith (69.4)

[Winger]

Fifita should have sat midway thru the 3rd quarter. The coaching has been dreadful and CBB is starting to lose important people, 6 games in, as an insider Arizona good guy. He isnt the AD’s coach either. I guess its still early but its looking like Scheer was right.

[BBQ wildcat]

We are hot garbage. Can’t wait till Brennen is fired. Gonna have to wait a long time.

Over/under is 4.5 years