Wildcats shelve red uniforms in 2022-23, stay committed to retro blue road unis

LOS ANGELES — By wearing their blue “1997” retro uniforms for Saturday’s game — against a team whose main color is a different shade of blue — the Arizona Wildcats pretty much signaled that they just aren’t into their new red uniforms.

UA’s new-look reds, which feature a “kicking R” type of font, were worn by half of the Wildcats for their Red-Blue Game but did not make an appearance for the entire regular season. Arizona staffers, however, did wear red pullovers for the game at UCLA.

During all road games this season, Arizona players have stuck with their retro blue uniforms, informally referred to by the Final Fours achieved in them: They wore their 1988 version Thursday at USC and the “1997s” on Saturday.

“I just think against UCLA you gotta go with the tradition,” UA equipment manager Brian Brigger said. “In this rivalry, you’ve gotta have the ‘97s.”

UA will go all-in with the ‘97s next week too. Brigger said he could only take two sets of uniforms to Las Vegas for the Pac-12 Tournament, so the second-seeded Wildcats will wear white 1997s throughout, unless they face top-seeded UCLA in the championship game, in which case they will wear the same ’97 blues they wore Saturday.

Brigger said it is possible Arizona will switch things up for the NCAA Tournament, but it doesn’t sound too likely.

“We wore them the last time we won the national championship,” Brigger said. “So maybe they’ll bring us some luck.”

True senior

The NCAA’s decision to give players participating in the COVID year of 2020-21 an extra year of eligibility continues to complicate Senior Days, as it did Saturday at Pauley Pavilion.

While UCLA seniors Jaime Jaquez, Tyger Campbell and Kenneth Nwuba still have the extra year if they want it (Jaquez appears certain to leave), the three joined fifth-year senior David Singleton for Saturday’s Senior Day ceremonies.

Singleton, once a recruiting target of former UA coach Sean Miller, decided to return this season after spending the previous four with the Bruins.

Earlier this week before playing in what was his school-record 158th game for the Bruins on Saturday, Singleton expressed no regrets about sticking around.

“Staying here was a dream come true,” Singleton said. “I feel like I’m impacting the team on and off the court, and that we’re being successful because of that.

“I’m from Los Angeles. There’s no other school at the college level that I’d want to wear the jersey for, and I’ve really prospered from that decision.”

Cold-weather party

Students at the front of the line to enter Pauley Pavilion said they showed up at 10 p.m. Friday, while a flood rushed in at about 2 a.m. Saturday In all, about 200 student fans camped overnight with sleeping bags and tents, despite temperatures that dipped into the mid-40s.

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

“It was a party scene,” said one student, rushing to get inside as the doors opened before she could give her name.

Ass-whooper

UA coach Tommy Lloyd took a late afternoon trip to ESPN’s Los Angeles studio Friday to sit down for an interview with Neil Everett, who shares Pacific Northwest roots and a long relationship with Lloyd.

The interview played on the West Coast edition of “SportsCenter” Friday night.

Among the highlights, at least for us, was when Everett asked Lloyd to rate his pickleball skills — and as Lloyd was saying it was a “work in progress,” a tweet from the Star’s Justin Spears appeared on the screen behind Lloyd, in which Spears noted that Lloyd had said “ass-whoopings are free.”

Lloyd, who had no idea that the tweet would be shown, read it and responded by noting:

“I think Justin Spears, I could be pretty confident I could give him a free ass-whooping. But a lot of the guys I play with are a lot better than me.”

Spellcheck, please

The newsletter delivered on top of each student-section seat, called “The Dirt from the Den,” noted that Arizona has been “collecting losses to mid-level Pac-12 teams” while taking a shot at Kerr Kriisa’s (occasional) facial hair.

“He’s trying to pull off the style of our very own Jaime Jaquez, and it just isn’t working,” The Den said. “Even Jaime’s facial hair is more powerful than Kerr’s. I mean, look at the headband difference. One’s trying, the other’s succeeding.”

However, “The Dirt” might have lost some credibility when it failed to spell both Tucson and Tucsonans correctly.

“Much of our anger toward the Tusconans (sic) revolves around Kerr Kriisa,” it said.

The big number

0.0 — The amount of alcohol in the free Heineken-branded beer offered to fans who sign up as designated drivers during UCLA games.