“Emphasis One.”
No, it’s not the next Christopher Nolan sci-fi epic. It’s not the name of Elon Musk’s newest SpaceX rocket either.
That’s how Arizona coach Jedd Fisch framed the No. 1 item on his offseason priority list — reversing the Wildcats’ woeful turnover margin.
It’s easy to understand how Fisch came that conclusion. Arizona, which visits Washington State on Friday, is last in the nation in that category.
The Wildcats also rank last in red-zone touchdown percentage. Improving that aspect of the offense is Emphasis Two.
Having covered that ground earlier in the week, we’ll dive into the turnover topic in the latest installment of “Cats Stats.” How bad is it? What’s behind it? And is luck — or lack thereof — playing a role?
The raw numbers aren’t pretty. Arizona is minus-14 through 10 games. The next-closest teams (FIU, Kentucky, Southern Miss) are minus-11.
Among the 14 teams that are minus-7 or worse, only one — 7-3 Kentucky — is above .500. Six of the seven teams that are 1-9 are minus-5 or worse.
Arizona has 20 giveaways, which is tied for 119th-most in the country. All seven of the teams that are 1-9 have committed 14 or more turnovers.
The Wildcats don’t have an unusually high number of fumbles; they’ve lost four. Interceptions? That’s another story.
UA quarterbacks have combined to throw 16 picks, tied for most in the nation. The Wildcats haven’t been intercepted that many times since 2005, when Richard Kovalcheck threw 11 interceptions and Willie Tuitama threw five.
It’s no secret that Arizona’s QB play largely has been substandard this season. Five Wildcats have combined for a 9-to-16 touchdown-to-interception ratio, and Arizona’s 109.2 efficiency rating is the worst in the Pac-12.
There have been encouraging signs lately, though. Will Plummer hasn’t thrown an interception in two of the past three games. The only other time that happened this season was Jordan McCloud’s second start — one week after he threw five at Oregon.
The progress shown by Plummer and McCloud suggests a rising comfort level in Fisch’s offense.
“It’s what we’ve strived for the whole time,” offensive coordinator Brennan Carroll said of Plummer’s recent play. “That we’ve made improvements, albeit late in the season, is really important. That will never not be the focus.”
While no one would suggest that Arizona’s overall QB play has been good enough this season, at least one set of numbers suggests the Wildcats have been unlucky when it comes to interceptions.
The general expectation is that about 20% of total passes defensed (interceptions plus pass breakups) will be intercepted. Entering this week, that figure stood at 20.6%, per CFBStats.com.
UA opponents have 23 pass breakups this season, for a total of 39 passes defensed. They have intercepted those throws at a 41% clip — nearly double the national average.
That isn’t to say Arizona’s upside-down TD-INT ratio is strictly a product of misfortune. Anyone who has watched the 2021 Wildcats play could tell you that.
But has any other team in the country had three screen passes picked off? The latest one happened in the Cal game on a deflected ball. It was the second tipped-pass interception of the game. Both caromed into the air and landed in the arms of Golden Bears linebackers.
This past week, Arizona safety Jaxen Turner hit Utah quarterback Cameron Rising as he was throwing a rollout pass. The ball fluttered like a shanked punt. Somehow, it found its way to Devaughn Vele for a 20-yard completion.
Interception luck can go both ways.
The UA defense has 33 pass breakups. Yet the Wildcats have only four picks. They have turned only 10.8% of total passes defensed into interceptions — about half the national rate.
Arizona’s lack of takeaways — six so far, third-fewest in the nation — has flummoxed defensive coordinator Don Brown. Especially when you consider how much more pressure the Wildcats are generating against opposing quarterbacks.
Arizona has 19 sacks through 10 games, matching its total from the previous two seasons. Over that 17-game span, the Wildcats had 18 takeaways.
“We’ve made significant improvement in that area the last few weeks in terms of getting pressure, sacks, quarterback knockdowns,” said Brown, whose defense has produced 11 sacks in the past four games. “It just hasn’t gone our way.
“Usually when you’re knocking the quarterback down, it leads to good things.”
Brown’s defenses at Michigan weren’t amazing at taking the ball away, but they were respectable for the most part. The Wolverines had between 17 and 20 takeaways in each of Brown’s first four seasons in Ann Arbor. They had only four last season.
Luck played at least some role in that downturn. Michigan converted only two of 24 passes defensed into interceptions, or 8.3%, in 2020. In Brown’s first four seasons, that figure was 18.2%.
Fumble luck has worked against the 2021 Wildcats to a slight degree. The general expectation for fumble recovery rate is around 50%. Defensively, Arizona is right there (2 of 4). UA opponents have recovered four of the Wildcats’ five fumbles, or 80%. One or two of those should have bounced Arizona’s way.
But even if you make all the adjustments for “average luck,” the Wildcats still would be slightly in the red in turnover margin — minus-2 after rounding. That’s a heck of a lot better than the current situation — but far from where Fisch wants to be.
