Each week throughout the football season, we’ll take an in-depth look at the Arizona Wildcats from a statistical perspective. Here’s the latest edition of “Cats Stats.
Editor’s note
Each week throughout the football season, we’ll take an in-depth look at the Arizona Wildcats from a statistical perspective.
We’re big believers here at “Cats Stats” that every yard matters. We believe in the importance of field position. It’s one of the reasons punting — yes, punting — ranks among the Arizona Wildcats’ chief concerns entering their Pac-12 opener against UCLA on Saturday.
But not all yardage-related statistics carry as much meaning as some would have you think.
Take 300-yard passing games by quarterbacks, for example. That’s been a benchmark for QBs for a long time, although, as the game becomes faster-paced and more passing-oriented, it isn’t as big a deal as it once was.
Still, it’s a feat. If you’re in a non-Air Raid offense, it’s notable. But it doesn’t necessarily translate to winning — especially in the case of UA quarterback Khalil Tate.
Tate is in rare company when it comes to total offense. He is one of only two active Power 5 conference quarterbacks to accumulate more than 5,000 passing yards and 2,000 rushing yards. The other is Oklahoma’s Jalen Hurts. Only one other Pac-10/12 quarterback has done it: Oregon’s Marcus Mariota.
In this year’s opener, Tate joined an equally exclusive club: He became just the second Pac-10/12 QB to pass for more than 350 yards and rush for more than 100 in the same game. The only other? Arizona’s Matt Scott, in 2012.
The difference between Scott’s and Tate’s performances is that the Wildcats won that ’12 game vs. USC and lost this season at Hawaii. Tate will be the first to tell you that winning matters more to him than individual numbers.
Of course, QB wins is a stat many analysts have debunked. Much like wins for pitchers in baseball, the argument goes, the end result isn’t always an accurate reflection of a quarterback’s performance. Many factors beyond his control help determine the outcome of a game.
Our goal today is to sift through Tate’s game logs to determine what stats of his, if any, truly correlate to winning.
Before we get going, a really quick disclaimer: We’re throwing out games from 2016, Tate’s freshman year, when he was 17 years old to start the season and a part-time player; we’re classifying the ’17 Colorado game as a start, even though it technically wasn’t; and we’re ignoring the ’18 Utah game, which was a start but saw Tate exit in the first quarter because of injury.
Under those parameters, Tate has a career record of 12-10. When he throws for 300-plus yards, Arizona is 2-3.
Let’s take a closer look at those games to provide a layer of context:
- Purdue, 2017: Tate achieves career highs in yards (302) and TD passes (five), the last of which puts the Wildcats in the lead with 3:21 left. The Boilermakers reclaim the lead with 1:44 to go, and a Tate interception seals a 38-35 loss in the Foster Farms Bowl.
- Houston, 2018: The Wildcats trail 31-0 at halftime. Tate throws for 341 yards, but most come in garbage time, including 194 in the second half. Arizona loses 45-18. This is also the game in which Tate first hurts his ankle, in the first quarter.
- Southern Utah, 2018: One week later, Tate and the offense produce one big play after another. He sets a career high in passing yards for the third time in four games (349) and needs just 20 attempts to get there. He matches his career best with five TD passes. Arizona rolls 62-31.
- Colorado, 2018: Tate authors arguably his best performance as a passer, going 17 of 22 for 350 yards with five TDs and one INT in a 42-34 UA victory. His 77.3% completion rate is a season high.
- Hawaii, 2019: Tate throws for a career-best 361 yards and three TDs – but also throws two picks, including one in the red zone in the fourth quarter with Arizona trailing by three points. The defense surrenders another touchdown, and the Wildcats lose 45-38.
Looking for a mark of success? Arizona is 6-2 when quarterback Khalil Tate rushes for 100 yards or more.
One could argue that Tate played extremely well in three of those five games (Purdue, Southern Utah, Colorado) and well enough to win in one other (Hawaii). The Houston game was a team-wide fiasco; hardly anyone played well, and those stats are meaningless.
Yet Tate’s record, as noted, is just 2-3. And if his rushing total against the Rainbow Warriors were 109 yards instead of 108, it might be 3-2.
Conclusion: inconclusive. The 300-yard passing threshold isn’t the indicator we’re looking for.
What about 100-yard rushing games? When Tate rushes for 100-plus yards, Arizona is 6-2. And, as mentioned, the Hawaii game easily could have gone the other way – Tate was tackled a yard short of the end zone on the final play.
The only other UA loss in which Tate rushed for 100-plus yards came against USC in 2017. He amassed 161 yards on the ground on a career-high 26 carries. The Wildcats rallied from a 22-point third-quarter deficit to tie the score at 35-all in the fourth. They lost 49-35. Tate threw a pair of picks in the fourth.
Conclusion: We’re getting warmer. Arizona wins 75% of the time when Tate rushes for 100-plus yards. It’s inarguably a positive development for the Wildcats when that happens.
But is it the stat to look at to determine whether Tate and the UA will win? It’s one of them, for sure. But it might not be the best.
Touchdown-to-interception ratio is a tempting direction to take this. Tate has a 25-8 TD-INT ratio in wins, 21-12 in losses. But he has won when throwing more picks than touchdowns (including the Sept. 14 Texas Tech game, the first time the UA has won when Tate has two INTs) and has lost when doing the reverse (including games with ratios of 5-1, 4-1 and 3-1).
The stat that jumps off the screen like J.J. Taylor hurdling a tackler is Tate’s pass attempts in wins vs. losses — and his corresponding efficiency.
Arizona has won only one time when Tate attempts more than 25 passes — last year’s Oregon game, when he went 19 of 33 for 189 yards in a 44-15 UA romp. The Wildcats are 0-9 otherwise.
Meanwhile, when Tate throws 25 or fewer passes — again, including only the games outlined earlier — Arizona is 11-1. The only loss came against Arizona State in 2017, when Tate missed most of the second half because of injury.
In wins, Tate averages 18.5 passing attempts with a 66.2% completion rate. In losses, those figures are 32.5 and 54.8. If you take out the ASU game: 34.7 and 53.5.
Which isn’t to say Tate is a substandard passer. He has improved over his time here and is on track for a career high in completion rate (63.3%).
The point is that the best way to slow the Tate-led Wildcats is to get the lead and force them into must-pass situations. If they’re able to use all the elements of their offense, they’re difficult to defeat.
