Quick hitters from the Arizona Wildcats’ post-practice media availability Wednesday morning:
* With two games left and no bowl berth, much of the talk focused on recruiting and what’s in store for next season. Given the desire for a quick turnaround, UA coach Rich Rodriguez was asked whether he’d pursue more junior-college and graduate transfers than usual. “You don’t want to get too many because you’ve got to build your program,” he said. “But we need some grown men.”
* Rodriguez said he and his staff will take advantage of their time off in December to focus on recruiting. "We play Friday night,” he said of the season finale vs. Arizona State. “Saturday morning, we’ll all be on the road hitting it hard."
* Rodriguez views linebacker as Arizona's thinnest position and the one that's most in need of reinforcements. The Wildcats lose several seniors at the “Mike” and “Will” positions.
* Rodriguez praised one of them, grad transfer Michael Barton, for his leadership during tough times. We’ll have more on Barton – and fellow Cal transfer Freddie Tagaloa – later this week.
* Rodriguez on the senior class as a whole: "They’ve given a lot to our program. They’ve won three bowl games. It’s been a great class - everything that you’d want, on the field, off the field, leadership."
* Rodriguez expects more newcomers in next year's recruiting class to play early “than probably any time since I’ve been here.” That doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll start.
* One of the big keys for Arizona at Oregon State on Saturday: Get off to a good start. It would boost the Wildcats’ confidence and keep guys engaged. It’s been hard to maintain confidence amid the UA’s seven-game losing streak.
* Rodriguez said Oregon State uses a lot of spread principles on offense, including jet sweeps and motions, "to get you off-balance defensively." That sort of sideline-to-sideline action will test the Arizona defense, which has had issues tackling in space.
* Rodriguez said the Beavers’ defense mixes odd and even fronts and is "very pressure oriented; (they) love to blitz, especially in obvious pass situations." Arizona hasn’t handled blitzes particularly well this season.
* Rodriguez won’t wait until the end of the season to evaluate the program. "Trust me," he said. "I’ve gone through it a hundred times a day."
