Two days later, Jedd Fisch was still pondering what could have been. The possibilities were enticing.
By Fisch’s estimate, Arizona’s passing offense left 150 yards on the field during the Wildcats’ season-opening loss to BYU on Saturday. Starting quarterback Gunner Cruz still passed for 336 yards. If he had connected on the ones he missed, he would have approached 500.
After most games, quarterbacks will point out a handful of plays they wish they could have back. The question with Cruz is how quickly he can reduce that number. Fisch believes Cruz — and the offense as a whole — will get better as the season progresses. Everything is still relatively new.
“I would think that we would improve from this week to next week, next week to the following week,” Fisch said Monday. “Gunner’s started one game in his life. If he can maintain that (statistical pace), he’s gonna have a heck of a career. We’re gonna do everything we can to help him get to that point.
“Each opportunity he has, hopefully he’ll be smarter with the ball, we’ll get the ball out faster and we’ll know what to call better.”
Fisch conceded that early in the game “we were just trying to get a feel for our team.” Arizona had three points and 172 yards in the first half, 13 and 254 in the second. Cruz passed for 123 yards in the first half, 213 in the second.
Cruz’s starting debut came with his second school under his third coach. He began his college career at Washington State under Mike Leach. Cruz played last season under Nick Rolovich. Now Cruz is at Arizona under Fisch, whose system is nothing like what Cruz operated at WSU.
Neither Leach’s offense nor Rolovich’s makes much use of the tight end. So maybe it isn’t surprising that Cruz failed to locate Bryce Wolma on two or three occasions. No. 2 quarterback Will Plummer also missed Wolma for a possible third-down conversion.
“We had the tight ends open many different times in the game,” said Fisch, whose team opens its home schedule Saturday against San Diego State. “We have to convert on those. We have to hit those. ... We gotta make those plays.”
UA coach Jedd Fisch wants to see better red-zone execution from his team.
Fisch has toggled between optimism and disappointment regarding the opener, which ended with Arizona on the wrong end of the scoreboard for the 13th straight time. He was most disappointed in the Wildcats’ red-zone output. They penetrated the 20-yard line four times and didn’t score a single touchdown. Lucas Havrisik also missed two field goal attempts.
Arizona’s red-zone scoring rate was only 50%. Fisch would like to see its touchdown rate approach 70%.
“We have to get better in the red area,” Fisch said. “We’ll practice the red area tonight and every day this week to make sure that we continue to improve there, so those things hopefully don’t happen again.”
Morgan, Joiner back?
Arizona could get two of its key players back for Saturday’s home opener.
Fisch said left tackle Jordan Morgan, who missed the season opener because of a lower-leg injury, will be a game-time decision against SDSU.
Morgan traveled with the team but didn’t suit up. Fisch said Morgan “wasn’t healthy enough to play the amount of snaps we were going to play (83 vs. BYU).” Whether he can do it vs. the Aztecs will be determined in practice this week.
Receiver Jamarye Joiner has been working on the side for most of the offseason after having foot surgery in the spring. He dressed for warmups before the BYU game and participated in drills.
Arizona wide receiver Jamarye Joiner was a spectator for the BYU game in Las Vegas, but he may be on the field for the Wildcats during the home opener against San Diego State on Saturday.
Joiner had projected a return in Week 3 or 4 but could make his 2021 debut this Saturday, Fisch said.
“He’s doing great,” Fisch said. “Dr. Joiner wasn’t exactly sure how he was going to recover.”
Fisch expects Joiner to practice to some extent this week.
Donovan Laie slid from guard to tackle in place of Morgan but got banged up in the second half. Laie’s mother said via Twitter that her son rolled his ankle and is “doing well.” He never left the game but was limping noticeably.
Fourth-and-go
Fisch faced fourth-and-1 decisions twice in the first half of his UA debut. Both times, the Wildcats were inside their 35-yard line.
Fisch went for it both times, calling upon Cruz — who’s listed at 6-5, 227 pounds — to execute quarterback sneaks. He converted on both occasions.
Fisch didn’t rely on any statistical data to make those calls.
“None of it’s really analytics; it’s just kind of how the game goes, how do you feel about your team,” Fisch said. “I don’t have a chart or a sheet or a research study regarding what we should do and how we should do it when it comes to that type of deal, other than a 2-point chart and the end-of-the-game time-management chart. The rest of it just comes down to what you think and what you feel.
“In that case, I felt really good about us being able to convert.”
The Wildcats were 3 of 3 in fourth-down situations. They were 5 of 17 (29.4%) on third down.
Sellout sought
It’s no secret by now: Fisch wants a sellout Saturday, or something close to it.
Fisch has been pining for a crowd of 50,000-plus for weeks. Arizona played in front of 54,541 fans at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas in the opener, although most of them were rooting for BYU.
“You could hear the Arizona crowd when we got that safety, that (kick) return, that touchdown, that 2-point play,” Fisch said, referring to the Wildcats’ rally in the third quarter. “You could feel that shift in momentum.
“Now it’s up to us to take that thing on Saturday night and make it absolutely an intimidating environment, an incredible environment. We need to match the intensity of some of the other stadiums and programs across the country when it comes to the homefield advantage.”
The UA last drew a home crowd of greater than 50,000 in the 2018 Territorial Cup game. The average attendance in 2019 was 39,532. The latest ticket-sales update was unavailable Monday.
Extra points
Fisch expressed relief that BYU cornerback Keenan Ellis seems to be OK after suffering an apparent neck injury and losing consciousness in the first quarter of last week’s game. Ellis had to be taken out on a stretcher. He was walking by Sunday morning without pain, a BYU spokesman told local media. “That was a scary time on the field,” Fisch said.
The SDSU game is the first of two in a row on Pac-12 Networks. Roxy Bernstein and Yogi Roth will have the call.
