The Arizona Wildcats defeated North Dakota State 31-28 Saturday night at Arizona Stadium. Here are some pertinent notes, quotes and statistics from the UA’s victory:
NOTES
* Arizona has won two of its first three games – topping its win total from the previous two seasons combined. The Wildcats had won only once in 24 games entering this season.
* Arizona ended the Bison’s six-game winning streak against FBS opponents. NDSU fell to 9-4 all time against FBS foes.
* Arizona had only one penalty for 15 yards. The last time the Wildcats were flagged only once in a game was Oct. 5, 2019, against Colorado – Arizona’s last victory before losing 20 consecutive games.
* North Dakota State ran for 283 yards, the most Arizona has allowed in a win since giving up 300 to Colorado on Oct. 7, 2017.
* Arizona had three rushing touchdowns – one apiece by QB Jayden de Laura and running backs Michael Wiley and Jonah Coleman. It was the first time the Wildcats had three rushing touchdowns in a game since Nov. 2, 2019, against Oregon State.
* Wiley has scored a touchdown in back-to-back games and seven of his past eight contests dating to last season. Coleman’s touchdown was the first of his career.
* De Laura notched career highs in both rushing attempts (10) and yards (50).
* WR Jacob Cowing hauled in his fifth touchdown catch of the year. His five TD grabs are the most by a Wildcat since Jamarye Joiner had five in 2019.
* After setting a career high with four catches for 51 yards last week vs. Mississippi State, TE Tanner McLachlan caught four passes for 50 yards in the first half vs. North Dakota State.
* DE Hunter Echols forced a fumble that was recovered by Jerry Roberts in the second quarter. It was the first career forced fumble for Echols and the first career fumble recovery for Roberts. Echols had eight tackles. Roberts had a team-high nine.
* With the fumble recovery, Arizona matched its takeaway total from last season (six). The Wildcats have forced at least one turnover in three straight games. The last time they did that was the first three games of the 2019 season.
* Tyler Loop made a 36-yard field goal and missed a 43-yard attempt. It was the first missed kick of any kind of Loop, who had made his first 15 career FG attempts. He’s 23 of 23 on extra points.
* Receiver Dorian Singer set a career high with 88 receiving yards and matched his career best with six receptions.
QUOTES
UA coach Jedd Fisch on being 2-1 going into Pac-12 play: “I think we're getting better. We are believing in the process of improving. We recognize that we're gonna have all sorts of different ways to win a game. We might win the game on offense, defense, special teams. It might not be pretty; it might be pretty. I don't know. But I know that our team embraces the grind. ... It meant a lot to our team to go 2-1 going into conference play. Our guys worked extremely hard. When our guys work that hard, they deserve victory. It's nice to see them get that.”
Fisch on defending NDSU’s run-oriented offense: “They just do something that you don't have to defend the rest of the season. It's like playing an option football team, when you play Air Force or one of the service academies randomly in the middle of your schedule. You run into a situation where you're defending something one week that you won't defend the other 11. So you have to handle a lot of gaps and you have to be able to be gap-sound there.”
Fisch on his growing relationship with de Laura: “The biggest thing I would say about Jayden and I and how we call the game and what we ask him to do is we've only done this for three games together. We're just building a relationship and we're building trust. I'm trying to learn what he needs and how to coach him every day in practice, and he needs to learn what I expect and what I want. It was a great learning experience last Saturday night. He probably saw some opportunities that he could have taken off and run. I'm glad to see that he did it this week.”
De Laura on his communication with Fisch: “We just talk. We don’t hide anything. If something's bothering me, or something’s bothering him, we just lay it out on the table.”
Singer on Fisch’s postgame message: “Whoever counts us out, just make sure we count ourselves in. Whoever is not in the locker room with us, they don't know what's going on is inside. Everybody just has their own opinions about us. But we know the real (deal).”
Roberts on the defense’s late heroics: “We know we didn't play our best game. But when that time came to where we needed a stop, I told our defense, ‘These are the moments that define our defense. These are big-time, and we should love them. So let's go out there and get a stop.’ ”
Roberts on NDSU’s Hunter Luepke, who had 180 scrimmage yards and three touchdowns: “He’s a heck of a player. I’ll give credit where it’s due. He's very physical. Not a very shifty runner, but he was straight downhill. He's gonna try to come at you.”
Echols on the trench battle: “They're very competitive. They wanted to compete and finish blocks. We want to compete too. I think we're physical as a D-line, and we pride ourselves on being physical. So it was a fun game. It was a competitive game. And we got the job done.”
NDSU coach Matt Entz on the loss: “I'm frustrated for our kids. We played really hard. I don't think anyone can ever question how hard our kids play, how well our coaches coach and how well our kids go about their business out there. I've been here long enough, and I've seen losses galvanize a team, and that's my anticipation. ... We got beat by a team that was better than us tonight.”
NDSU safety Michael Tutsie on whether the Bison let an opportunity slip away: "I would be lying if I said no. We came here to win. We came here expecting to win. We knew it was going to be a dogfight. We didn't expect to come here and do anything crazy. We expected to come in and do what we do. It felt like it slipped away. But we're going to learn from it and we're going to go back to work and do what we need to do.
STATS
* Arizona had 23 first downs; NDSU had 21
* NDSU had 407 total yards; Arizona had 394
* NDSU averaged 7.1 yards per play; Arizona averaged 6.2
* NDSU possessed the ball for 31 minutes, 18 seconds; Arizona had it for 28:42
* Arizona converted 5 of 11 third downs; NDSU was 3 of 7
* Arizona converted 1 of 2 fourth downs; NDSU was 0 of 2
* Arizona scored on all four trips into the red zone (3 TDs, 1 FG); NDSU was 2 of 3 (both TDs)
* NDSU’s average starting field position was its 30-yard line; Arizona’s was its 27
* NDSU QB Cam Miller completed 10 of 12 passes for 124 yards and 1 TD
* De Laura was 20 of 28 for 229 yards and 1 TD
* NDSU LB James Kaczor had a team-high 9 tackles, including 1 TFL
