Arizona Wildcats senior Samajie Grant is performing well under difficult circumstances.
Grant, a career-long wide receiver, shifted to tailback during the bye week last month. He has started there the past two weeks, rushing for 141 yards on 27 carries.
Every quarter, Grant looks more comfortable. But in many ways, he’s still feeling his way — still deciphering which decisions are the right ones in any given situation.
For example, in the first quarter against Washington State, Grant tried to hurdle Cougars safety Robert Taylor. Grant leaped high in the air, but Taylor remained upright and caught him, limiting Grant to a 6-yard gain.
“Watching the film, I could’ve just made him miss,” Grant said. “But as I’m seeing the play, all I was thinking of was making a play. Looking behind him in the game, I was telling myself, ‘If I get over him, I can go.’ So I tried it. I didn’t notice he was standing straight up almost. That definitely wasn’t good. I didn’t plan that one out right.”
The previous week against Stanford, Grant took a pitch to the right side and had nowhere to go. Instead of taking a short loss, he tried to cut back. The Wildcats ended up losing 24 yards on the play.
“I should’ve just gone down,” Grant said. “I kept trying to break tackles. Then, as I’m breaking them, I’m going backwards like an idiot. Now I kind of know how to read it and stuff. If something like that ever happened again … I’m just going to put my shoulder down and take the lost yardage.”
The thing is, Grant can break tackles and make defenders miss, and he knows it. Sometimes, it works to his and the Wildcats’ benefit.
Grant should have been stopped for a loss on his signature run to date — a 50-yard gain against Washington State. But Grant spun away from a would-be tackler in the backfield and outraced several others to the left sideline. He even switched the ball to his left hand at the end of the run to throw a stiff-arm at defensive back Shalom Luani.
It was a strong sign that Grant’s instincts as a running back — a position he played in high school — are coming back on line.
“I can’t really describe it,” Grant said. “It was kind of natural. It just kind of came.”
