Stats suggest new Arizona Wildcats OC Noel Mazzone will oversee balanced, quarterback-friendly attack

Of all the assistants Kevin Sumlin added to his first Arizona Wildcats coaching staff, Noel Mazzone is the most seasoned and probably the most important.

Mazzone will serve as Arizona’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach. He’ll be the staffer charged with maximizing Khalil Tate’s immense potential.

Mazzone has an extensive, impressive résumé that dates to the 1980s. He has tutored several quarterbacks who went on to play in the NFL, including Jason Campbell, Philip Rivers, Brock Osweiler and Brett Hundley. (Later this year, we can add another to that list: Josh Rosen.)

Mazzone also received his share of criticism at his last two stops, UCLA and Texas A&M – par for the course for the majority of offensive play-callers. Besides the head coach and quarterback, they’re the easiest target for media and fans.

But Sumlin obviously believes in Mazzone. Sumlin has hired him twice. The two go way back.

So what will Arizona’s offense look like under Mazzone? What can we expect?

Mazzone runs a version of the spread, incorporating no-huddle and zone-read concepts. An examination of the stats put up by his past eight offenses at Arizona State (2010-11), UCLA (2012-15) and Texas A&M (2016-17) shows that he’s willing and able to adapt to the skill sets of his personnel – especially quarterbacks.

Here’s some of what we discovered after digging into those numbers:

RUN/PASS RATIO

Arizona will have a more balanced offense under Mazzone and Sumlin than it had the past two seasons under Rich Rodriguez.

The Wildcats became very run-heavy in Rodriguez’s final two campaigns. Last year they ran the ball 65.4 percent of the time. In 2016, they ran it 59 percent of the time.

(All such ratios in this piece are adjusted for sacks, which count toward rushing totals in college football; we have subtracted them from rushing attempts and added them to passing attempts to reflect the actual intent of those plays.)

Over the past eight seasons, Mazzone’s offenses have passed the ball 51.6 percent of the time. But those numbers are skewed by three seasons: the two at ASU and his final year at UCLA.

In those three seasons, Mazzone’s offenses threw the ball on 56.3 percent of plays. The common thread: All three teams had tall pocket quarterbacks. Mazzone’s QBs at ASU were Steven Threet (6-5) and Brock Osweiler (6-7). In his last year at UCLA, Mazzone had Josh Rosen (6-4).

Isolating the other five seasons – when Mazzone had quarterbacks more similar in skill to the one he’s inheriting, Khalil Tate – the ratio flips: Mazzone ran it 51 percent of the time. Last year at Texas A&M it was an almost perfect split: 477 rushing plays and 478 passing plays.

(One additional note about the numbers: Some “run plays” are actually quarterback scrambles, which aren’t discernable via the available data. So there’s some margin for error in play here.)

QB DESIGNED RUNS

If you watch Trevor Knight’s highlight reel from 2016, you’ll see plenty of quarterback run plays – mainly zone reads and QB draws, the latter typically out of empty sets.

Meanwhile, Brett Hundley’s highlights from 2013 – his redshirt-sophomore year and second season as the starter – feature a ton of scrambles, with a handful of designed runs thrown into the mix.

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Rodriguez utilized Tate as an extra running back at times, dialing up “outside zone” plays and sweeps to complement the zone reads and other elements of the offense – and, of course, to take advantage of Tate’s talent with the ball in his hands.

The numbers suggest Mazzone will work with what he has, as any good coach should.

Mazzone utilized three dual-threat quarterbacks at UCLA and Texas A&M: Hundley, Knight and Kellen Mond. Each averaged at least seven rushes per game (again, after subtracting sacks).

Hundley started for three seasons under Mazzone and averaged 8.9 rushes per game. Knight averaged 8.2 in his 11 appearances in 2016. Mond averaged seven rushes in 10 games last year.

Contrast that with the somewhat mobile Osweiler (4.2) in 2011 and classic pocket passer Rosen (1.7) in ’15. Their rushing attempts, or lack thereof, not only illustrate what types of players they are but also suggest that Mazzone won’t force-feed his philosophy or system.

Hundley and Knight had tremendous success as runners under Mazzone. Hundley rushed for 1,392 yards and 21 touchdowns across the 2013 and ’14 seasons; Knight rushed for 614 and 10 in 2016.

Tate, of course, eclipsed Hundley’s two-year rushing total in less than a full season. Tate needed just 153 attempts to gain 1,411 yards. Subtracting the 13 times he was sacked, Tate averaged 12.7 carries in 11 games. The eight times he played the majority of the game, he averaged 15.5 rushing attempts.

That’s higher than anyone under Mazzone over the past eight seasons. Tate is an extraordinary talent, but 15 rushes per game is probably a few too many. Given what Mazzone did with Hundley and Knight, expect that number to settle in the 8-10 range next season - more than enough to keep defenses honest.

OVERALL SUCCESS

We looked at two basic stats – points per game and total offense – and found that Mazzone’s offenses have been remarkably consistent over the past eight seasons.

Mazzone’s teams ranked between 20th and 34th nationally in scoring in seven of those eight years, with only UCLA in 2015 slipping below that standard. Those Bruins, with true freshman Rosen at quarterback, ranked 45th.

That UCLA team’s 32.2-point average was the lowest among the eight teams – but just barely below 2010 ASU (32.5) and 2017 Texas A&M (32.7). The 2013 Bruins had the highest average (36.9) and national ranking (20).

Mazzone’s teams ranked between 22nd and 38th nationally in total offense (yards per game) in seven of the past eight seasons, with only last year’s A&M team ranking lower. The 2017 Aggies were 56th in total offense. They toggled between Mond, a true freshman, and Nick Starkel, a redshirt freshman, at quarterback throughout the season.

From 2011-16, Mazzone’s offenses averaged between 445.8 and 467 yards per game. Two units were worse: the 2010 Sun Devils (425.7) and 2017 Aggies (406.8).

In terms of conference rankings, Mazzone’s offenses finished third twice, fourth twice and never worse than seventh in scoring. They ranked second once (2016), third once (2012) and as low as eighth (2017) in total offense.

Taking all the numbers and the caliber of competition into consideration, one could argue that Texas A&M in 2016 was Mazzone’s best offense; the Aggies ranked second in yards and third in points in the rough-and-tumble SEC.

Texas A&M averaged 60.2 fewer yards per game last season, and almost all of it resulted from a drop in rushing from 211.8 yards per game to 155.6.

Mazzone assumes control of an offense that averaged 309.3 rushing yards last season, third most in the nation. Where he takes it from here will be fascinating to watch. The numbers accumulated over the past eight seasons at least give us an idea.