The Star's longtime columnist also discusses how the 1967 Wildcat football team knocked off Ohio State thanks to some creative scouting, some 56 before Michigan's current saga, Arizona (and Canyon del Oro) goalkeeper Hope Hisey's career for the books, Andre iguodala's retirement from playing, but not the NBA, Arizona football's big fourth quarter against Colorado Saturday en route to win No. 7, and more.
Lloyd fearless in scheduling, but a communicator and teacher more than 'The Boss'
Tommy Lloyd is a new model for head coaches in college sports. He’s not a commander or control freak. Nothing like a Sean Miller or Rich Rodriguez, the my-way-is-the-only-way coach from an outdated model of the 1900s.
Yes, he’s in charge, but Lloyd’s a communicator and a teacher more than The Boss. He’s open to suggestions and input. As with Jedd Fisch on Arizona’s football sidelines, Lloyd is in constant conversation with assistant coaches Jack Murphy, Riccardo Fois and Steve Robinson.
And that’s not where it stops. Lloyd routinely invites former Arizona basketball assistant Jim Rosborough to practice, invites him to film sessions, seeks his input from a career that included four Final Fours.
During Arizona’s victory over Duke on Friday, ESPN’s Jay Bilas said he spent Thursday at Arizona’s practice session. “Arizona does as good a job as anybody at taking a scouting report and communicating it to the team,’’ said Bilas. “Tommy really gets his team prepared.’’
At 48, Lloyd’s willingness to schedule Duke in a home-and-home series further reflects a “new way’’ of coaching at the highest level of college basketball. No wonder, as Bilas said Friday, that he considers Arizona “one of the biggest brands in college basketball.’’
To be one of the best, you've got to play the best.
The reason Arizona became a big brand in college basketball is that 40 years ago, Lute Olson began scheduling home-and-home series with Duke, Kansas, North Carolina, Villanova, Jerry Tarkanian’s UNLV powerhouses, you name it. That aggressive scheduling put the Wildcats on the map.
I consider Arizona’s Dec. 1987 game at Iowa the No. 1 nonconference road victory in UA history. Olson willingly went back to “The House That Lute Built’’ on Iowa’s campus, playing the No. 3 Hawkeyes at Carver-Hawkeye Arena. Arizona won 66-59, a monumental performance that catapulted the Wildcats to No. 1 in the AP poll a week later.
Arizona’s brand went national.
Not everybody does it that way. As Arizona was beating Duke on Friday, UCLA was playing Lafayette at home before a crowd of 6,259, or 45% capacity at Pauley Pavilion. Also on Friday, Oregon played Montana at home before a crowd of 7,141, or 57% capacity at Matthew Knight Arena.
Z-z-z-z-z.
Those expected to challenge Arizona for the Pac-12 title this year — UCLA, Colorado, Oregon and USC — do not have a nonconference road game of note. The league’s most challenging nonconference road games (not neutral court games) aren’t must-see events.
• Utah at Saints Mary’s
• Colorado at Colorado State
• Stanford at San Diego State
• USC at Auburn
• UCLA plays at Villanova, not on the Quakers’ home court, but at the Philadelphia 76ers arena.
• Oregon doesn’t play a nonconference game on anyone else’s home court.
In an interview with ESPN last week, Lloyd said “we’re a tough team; that’s our DNA.’’ Bingo. A lesser team would’ve cracked in the final four minutes at Duke’s Cameron Indoor Stadium. A not-so-tough team would’ve been compromised when freshman center Motiejus Krivas and freshman guard K.J. Lewis were deployed for a combined 25 minutes.
Krivas and Lewis produced a combined 12 points and nine rebounds in one of the most intimidating settings in college basketball. They were ready for the Big Game.
It all reflects on Lloyd and the way he operates Arizona’s basketball program.
Darrell Mudra is carried off the field following the Wildcats’ 14-7 win over Ohio State in 1967.
Before Michigan spygate, there were the 1967 Wildcats
When Darrell Mudra became Arizona’s football coach in 1967, he inherited a wicked schedule that included a Week 2 game at mighty Ohio State. Woody Hayes and company.
Long before Michigan and coach Jim Harbaugh became infested by an ongoing signal-stealing controversy, Mudra assigned UA assistant coach Cecil McGehee to fly to Ohio and spy on the Buckeyes’ practices the week of their opener against Arizona.
Incredibly, it worked. Arizona, a team that opened the season with a 36-17 loss to Wyoming and would finish 3-6-1, stunned the Buckeyes 14-7.
In a 1991 interview with the Star, McGehee, then an assistant athletic director at Colorado, said that when he arrived in Columbus he discovered a high-rise dormitory being built adjacent to the Buckeyes’ practice field.
“I found a floor partially finished; no students had moved in,’’ he said. He watched three OSU practices, taking notes, undiscovered by OSU personnel.
“I could tell what they were going to do,’’ said McGehee. He explained that Ohio State played a 5-2 defense with its strong safety always on the weak side of the field.
“We ran a power toss, a sweep to the short side of the field. We always had them outmanned. They weren’t real adaptive.’’
He further correctly detected that the old-school Hayes ran just five basic plays. McGehee phoned Mudra every day to detail Ohio State’s strategy. The Wildcats were ready, beating the Buckeyes, who finished 5-2 in the Big Ten and won the national title a year later. After that? Arizona was a softie. It completed its 3-6-1 season by losing 47-7 to Arizona State.
Arizona’s leading tennis coach dies
From 1959-72, you could make a case that Arizona was a tennis school. The Wildcats went 161-48, finished in the top four of the NCAA on five occasions, won six straight WAC championships and produced All-Americans such as Tucson High grad and future Wimbledon player Bill Lenoir.
Coach Dave Snyder’s program was so strong that the Wildcats had six All-Americans in that period. He was hired away by his alma mater, Texas, after 13 highly successful seasons, and became a Hall of Fame coach for the Longhorns. When he retired in 2000, Snyder had become the winningest active tennis coach in NCAA Division I after posting a 697-226 (.755) dual-match record in 42 total seasons at Texas and Arizona.
Snyder, 88, died last week in Austin, Texas.
I think Snyder is one of the 10 leading coaches in UA history, fitting comfortably in a group with Frank Busch, Jerry Kindall, Lute Olson, Dick Tomey, Mike Candrea, Rick LaRose, Pop McKale, Dave Murray and Frank Sancet. Unfortunately, Snyder has been overlooked and not been inducted into the UA Sports Hall of Fame, which began in 1976.
Arizona’s Hope Hisey (0) parries a Texas Tech penalty kick early in the first half of the Wildcats’ eventual 1-1 draw with the visiting Red Raiders on Sept. 7 at Murphey Field at Mulcahy Stadium in Tucson. Hisey, who played in high school at Canyon del Oro just completed her record-setting fifth year in net for the UA program.
Short stuff: Arizona, CDO GK Hisey caps career, Iguodala retired from playing, not NBA leadership
• Women’s soccer in the Pac-12 is so good that Arizona’s star goalie, CDO grad Hope Hisey, did not make the all-conference first, second or third teams last week. Hisey recently finished her career with a 2-1 victory over NCAA Tournament team Arizona State, set a school record with 366 career saves and is ranked No. 8 all-time in goalie saves in the Pac-12. She also was named the Pac-12 women’s scholar-athlete of the year, with a 4.0 GPA.
Hisey had a 1.45 goals-per-game average, and it ranked just No. 9 in the league. First-team goalkeeper of the year, Ryan Campbell of No. 2 ranked Stanford, had an average of .40. Stanford, USC and UCLA all survived first-round NCAA Tournament games last week. ...
Arizona guard Jemarl Baker Jr. (3) looks for help as the entire UCLA defense surrounds him in the lane in the first half of the Wildcats' Pac 12 basketball game at McKale Center, Tucson, Ariz., January 9, 2021.
• Remember Jemarl Baker, a guard on Arizona’s 2020 and 2021 basketball teams. Incredibly, he is playing his seventh NCAA basketball season, with the New Mexico Lobos. Baker played two years at Kentucky, two years at Arizona and two at Fresno State before gaining a hardship grant to play a seventh season. That’s college sports in 2023. Anything goes. Baker played just 23 minutes and scored three points in New Mexico’s opener against Saint Mary’s last week. At Arizona, he averaged 5.7 and 12.0 in his two years. He is 25 years old. By comparison, UA point guard Kylan Boswell is 18. ...
Jim Mielke
• A celebration of life for long-time Pima College and Sunnyside High School cross country and track coach Jim Mielke will be held Sunday at 5:30 p.m. on the PCC West Campus in the Proscenium Theatre. Mielke coached Pima College to the 1979 NJCAA cross country championship. ...
• Former Arizona basketball player Andre Iguodala was appointed the acting executive director of the NBA Players Association last week. He thus occupies a similar position to ex-Arizona basketball player Tony Clark, the executive director of MLB’s player association. Clark played at Arizona in 1990 before transferring to San Diego State. Clark also played baseball for the Triple-A Tucson Sidewinders in 2006 and 2009. Iguodala, who was involved with the NBA Players’ Association during his days with the Golden State Warriors, is so highly respected that some in the media have suggested he will be a strong candidate to someday replace NBA commissioner Adam Silver.
My two cents: UA football's 4th quarter at Colorado a clinic
For 55 minutes Saturday at Colorado’s Folsom Field, CU quarterback Shedeur Sanders was the best player on the field. He was a mini-Patrick Mahomes, darting here, escaping there, extending drives, putting 31 points on the board.
He was playing the role of Dream Killer.
And then it all changed. In the final 4:57, Arizona returned to its unexpected role as Dream Maker.
The Wildcats played a flawless 4:57.
Driving 67 yards on 11 plays, killing the clock, using the gains of America’s most underrated running back, Jonah Coleman, the Wildcats made the game’s first 55 minutes — a Prime Time November Comeback — a forgotten storyline.
Arizona won 34-31. If coach Jedd Fisch and his coordinators, Brennan Carroll and Johnny Nansen, have produced a better or more meaningful quarter of football this year, I can’t remember it.
Arizona third-year head coach Jedd Fisch, front center, looks on in the first half of the Wildcats' tight 34-31 win over Colorado Saturday in Boulder, Colorado. The Wildcats improved to 7-3 on the year, continuing the remarkable turnaround from going 1-11 in Fisch's first season.
It was a clinic on winning.
In the fourth quarter, Deion Sanders’ Buffaloes gained a mere 49 yards, went 0 for 3 on third downs, gained just two first-downs and couldn’t get the ball back when the game was at stake.
Can you imagine how helpless it felt to be in Prime’s shoes?
The Buffaloes ran just 12 plays in the fourth quarter. The 12th, a missed field goal attempt, enabled Fisch and Co., to put on a display of how to win a game in the clutch.
I can’t believe I’m typing this, but Arizona is 7-3. It has soared past .500, elevated its bowl position and won four consecutive games behind a freshman quarterback, Noah Fifita, which might be the most unexpected emergence of any college football team — from losers to winners — in 2023.
Unimaginably, two years since it went 1-11, it sets up the most important November finish in UA football since 2014. Games with Utah and Arizona State remain. Until Saturday, a split in those games would’ve been expected, almost acceptable.
But after rallying to win in Colorado, a new narrative has emerged — sweep. It’s no longer just someone’s wild dream.
