When Arizona coach Rich Rodriguez yanked Brandon Dawkins with 12 minutes 37 seconds remaining in Saturday’s game, replacing him with 18-year old sophomore Khalil Tate, the starter’s improved completion percentage didn’t matter.
Entering Saturday, Dawkins had a career 53.8 completion rate, and a hypothesis-turned-fallacy stated that if Dawkins didn’t improve, Arizona would falter against Houston and the season could fall off the rails. If he improved as a passer and bumped that percentage in the right direction, it stood to reason, the Wildcats would be in good shape.
Dawkins had completed 16 of 26 attempts when he was removed, numbers that would have been his best completion rate since last season’s Sept. 24 loss against Washington.
But his’ stats Saturday night were deceiving. Those 10 incompletions included a failed deep pass to Shawn Poindexter for the second week in a row, and an attempt that sailed over a wide open Tony Ellison in the end zone.
Trouble followed Dawkins, even when he ran, and the quarterback typically runs exceptionally well. He appeared to have a game-breaking run midway through Saturday’s game, only to be chased down by Houston All-American defensive tackle Ed Oliver, who is 6 feet 3 inches and 290 pounds.
Oliver stripped Dawkins of the ball, and the Cougars recovered.
On Arizona’s next offensive play, spotted at its own 1-yard line, Dawkins bobbled a snap and the Wildcats were forced to take a safety. The quarterback had never rushed for less than 44 yards in a game before Saturday; against Houston, he amassed 26 yards on 13 carries.
Dawkins averaged 6.1 yards per pass attempt, totaling 178 yards. In 13 career games, he’s only passed for more than that three times.
Nothing about the quarterback position is as simple as one statistic. Dawkins can complete 60 percent of his passes, but it doesn’t mean much if a dual- threat quarterback is gaining less than 30 yards on the ground, turning the ball over twice and missing wide open receivers.
Despite all that, UA coach Rich Rodriguez turned to Dawkins with the game on the line against Houston.
Arizona trailed by three points with 2:59 remaining when Dawkins lined up at the Wildcats’ 20 and took the snap. He missed Ellison on his first pass attempt, and threw an-ill advised short pass to J.J. Taylor for a loss of three yards on second down. Dawkins missed Poindexter on third-and-13, and scrambled for six yards on fourth down when he couldn’t find an open receiver.
Game over.
Still, Arizona might not have any other choice but to return to Dawkins next week. Tate is young, and although he’s athletically gifted, he’s still raw as a passer. He flashed mobility against Houston, evading defenders and rushing for 24 yards on four carries. He completed 5 of 8 pass attempts for 41 yards, but also threw an interception on his last pass attempt.
Behind Dawkins and Tate, the Wildcats dress two freshmen — former Catalina Foothills star Rhett Rodriguez, the coach’s son; and Donavan Tate, a 26-year-old who hadn’t played organized football in nearly a decade before joining the team this summer.
Throughout Rich Rodriguez’s coaching career, he’s always managed to turn lemons into lemonade at the quarterback position. He turned run-first-and-always quarterbacks into stars and standouts, from Pat White at West Virginia, to Denard Robinson at Michigan, to Matt Scott and B.J. Denker with Arizona.
His latest quarterback project may have stalled. Completion percentage, it turns out, is just a number.
