Arizona lined up for the second-half kickoff last Saturday at the Rose Bowl. The Wildcats were in uncharted territory.
Quarterback Anu Solomon was back in Tucson recovering from a knee injury. Brandon Dawkins, Solomon’s backup and last Saturday’s starter, was out after aggravating a pre-existing rib injury. Walk-on Zach Werlinger and true freshman Khalil Tate warmed up on the sideline.
Coach Rich Rodriguez was left with a decision: Stick with the ineffective Werlinger and risk getting blown out, or break the 17-year-old Tate’s presumed redshirt.
Rodriguez chose the latter. So what’s next?
Well, Tate is widely expected to make his first career start at Utah.
“That was always my mindset. Anywhere I was going to go, I wanted to play. Every freshman wants to play,” Tate said. “I wanted to play a lot, and luckily now my chance is coming.”
The future is, well, murkier.
Arizona is set to return a senior Solomon, a junior Dawkins and a sophomore Tate next year. The Wildcats’ class of incoming freshmen will include a pair of quarterbacks: four-star recruit Braxton Burmeister and two-star prospect Rhett Rodriguez.
Recently, the Wildcats received a verbal commitment from local star Jamarye Joiner of Cienega. He’ll join the quarterback fray in 2018. And Arizona has offered scholarships to six other signal-callers in the 2018 and 2019 classes.
The Wildcats shouldn’t wade into uncharted territory again anytime soon.
That is, assuming everybody sticks around.
“A lot of times you’re seeing back-up quarterbacks leave, let alone the fourth or fifth guy,” Rodriguez said. “But I think if they all know that if we have two we’re ready to win with, we’ll play two or maybe even three. Hopefully they like the program well enough that they’ll stay. We can always find five, and I think we can have five good ones.”
But how can Arizona convince quarterbacks to join, or stay, with so much other talent already in place or on the way?
THE RECRUITER
Rod Smith has been Rodriguez’s quarterback guru since their days together at West Virginia. Rodriguez actually recruited Smith to play quarterback for him at Glenville State. Now, Smith is often the lead recruiter on any quarterback the Wildcats are considering. Most recently, he was the driving force behind the commitments of Burmeister and Joiner.
Smith: “To me it’s a whole different dynamic now recruiting than when I first started because kids are more in tune, they’re more informed as far as who has what, what year they are. It’s almost like the first domino that always falls is that quarterback spot because they want to one know they have their spot and that they can help with the recruiting, and hopefully be the face of your recruiting class and your program. … You gotta plan things out, know how you sell your program, how you can best appeal to that kid’s interests.
“We never lie to them. We never do that. Sometimes we’re brutally honest and sometimes it hurts us, but for the most part kids appreciate it because they know exactly where they stand and what they have, and there’s never anything given to them, everything is going to be earned when they come here.”
“Everybody is trying to vie for sometimes the same kid at quarterback, so it becomes a sales job, it becomes, ‘What angle can I use to appease this guy?’ Some people use that angle of promising them playing time, promising them, ‘this will be the only guy we take in this class’. We don’t ever promise them playing time, we don’t promise them ‘you’ll be the starter if you come to Arizona.’ We do promise (that they’ll) get every opportunity to compete for the job and we say that whole-heartedly because we’re doing it right now.”
THE COMPETITION
Solomon was the first domino to fall, signing with the UA as its top quarterback recruit in 2013. The Wildcats then added Dawkins in 2014. The Wildcats’ 2015 class didn’t include a quarterback, and Tate was a somewhat surprising addition to the 2016 class. Arizona, though, was one of the few teams offering Tate the chance to play quarterback instead of receiver or safety. Burmeister verbally committed to the Wildcats as a sophomore in 2014. He re-opened his recruitment in March, then committed to the Wildcats again in May. Burmeister is thriving as a senior at La Jolla Country Day School, and is expected to compete to play right away. Rhett Rodriguez was Arizona’s first 2017 commit out of Catalina Foothills, and Cienega’s Joiner committed to the Wildcats last month. In doing so, he became the Wildcats’ first commit for 2018.
Burmeister: “I went over it with Coach Smith sophomore year when I went out there and then we’ve gone over it a few more times ever since. They definitely have a plan for me and I feel comfortable with that plan. I’m definitely going to get an opportunity to play, so it’s just me making the best out of that opportunity and waiting for my time.”
Tate: “Basically, every year is a new year. Every year the depth chart is wiped out. It’s not just like, just because you did pretty decent last year, you’re going to start this year. You still have to work for it and put the time in.”
Joiner: “I’ve always been the type to just go out there and play.”
Dawkins: “With me, the big thing on the competition is: it doesn’t matter who’s there right now or who’s there coming after, I’m gonna compete no matter where I’m at and I’m not gonna leave, no matter what.”
Burmeister: “The Arizona quarterbacks are awesome, it’s going to be awesome going in and competing with them and I definitely have a lot of confidence in my abilities. I see how they’re doing, and that’s something where I look up to them and see them, watching their games. I see them balling every weekend, so it’s going to be awesome to be a part of that and to compete with guys like that.”
Tate: “Every week, Coach Smith preaches competition. Everyone is one snap, two snaps away.”
