The eye test through the first week of Arizona’s training camp suggests the UA defense is ahead of the offense.
Even though the Wildcats are only in shells — that’s shoulder pads and helmets — the defense has been noticeably better during the team periods.
“As a competitor, you want to beat the defense every time you’re on the field, but give a lot of credit to them,” Arizona quarterback Noah Fifita said. “Great, great players on that side of the field that make our jobs very difficult.”
Growing pains were inevitable. Star wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan is rehabbing from a leg injury he suffered in the spring; newcomers and rising receivers alike are integrating themselves in the rotation; three new running backs (Quali Conley, Jacori Croskey-Merritt and Kedrick Reescano) are settling in, too; and the offensive line is searching for its best five-man lineup.
Additionally, the Wildcats are "still working through a lot of things" in a potpourri of offensive concepts. That includes those of head coach Brent Brennan and offensive coordinator Dino Babers, along with the system Arizona played under former head coach Jedd Fisch that placed the UA No. 20 nationally in total offense last season.
“There’s a lot of differences between the coaching staff, new players and new scheme, so we expected it to be different,” Fifita said. “All in all, it’s been great. ... We have a lot to improve on offensively, a lot to improve on individually.”
Arizona is mixing the old with the new, while the defense, under defensive coordinator Duane Akina, is still in its 4-2-5 base defense with several returning starters.
“At this stage of the game, the defense is always ahead of the offense, because the offense is putting in plays, massive amount of plays, and the defense is working on their defensive schemes and stuff like that,” Babers said. “I don’t want you to feel like we’ve been doing terrible out there. That’s just how practice is. We’ve gotta get all of our formations, protections, shifts, all that stuff in. Once we get that stuff in, we can start settling down and start judging performance and finding out what we’re good at and what we’re not good at.”
Babers spoke to local media this week following a training camp session. Here are some of the items he discussed:
What are the benefits, if any, of having McMillan sidelined to begin training camp?
A: “If someone were to tell us T-Mac didn’t turn pro, that he was going to stay with us and not go to another school and then sit out during spring ball and camp and then come in right before the season and play. Would we be happy with that? I think we might agree to that.”
Arizona wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan (4), while still rehabbing at that point from an injury suffered in spring, talks to strength coach Cullen Carroll during the Wildcats’ first practice of training camp on July 31 at the Dick Tomey Practice Fields.
Arizona center Josh Baker described the offensive system as ‘nasty.’ What do you think about that?
A: “It makes my hair stand up that our starting center used the word ‘nasty’ about an offense. As they go, we go. I grew up in the age where everyone used to call offensive linemen ‘hogs.’ I say our offensive linemen aren’t hogs, they’re elephants. They’re elephants. Everyone says the lion is the king of the jungle. That’s not true. I’ve seen many lions look at a whole bunch of elephants and go, ‘I ain’t going down there, those guys are big!’ Elephants are the king of the jungle. As they go, we go. If Baker is going to lead and he says we’re nasty, then we’re nasty.
“This is going to be a different journey. This is going to be a lot different. I’m doing a combination of things that I haven’t done before — and some of it is really cool. As I evolve in both of the offenses we combined, it’ll be fun to sprinkle in some of the experiences of the people I’ve been around to put the icing on the cake that makes it look and taste different.
“There’s definitely some stuff from the previous stop that could be sprinkled in there.”
Dino Babers, then the head football coach at Syracuse, speaks during a public memorial service for the late former Arizona head football coach Dick Tomey on May 31, 2019, at McKale Center in Tucson.
Between your past coaching experiences at Texas A&M and Baylor, what memories come to mind when you think about coaching in the Big 12?
A: “When I went to (Texas) A&M, we were extremely established with (former Aggies head coach) R.C. Slocum. That program had been around for a long time, he had been around for a long time.
“When I went back to Baylor, Baylor was supposedly the worst team. ... So that was a total rebuild when we went there. ... It’s amazing thinking about what that league has gone through and how good that league is. The biggest thing I want everyone to understand is we’re excited to go to the Big 12. The Big 12 has been around for a long time.
“I’m excited about getting back into some of those venues down south, where church is on Sunday and they start by saying something good about the man upstairs, then the next thing you know, it’s the score of the football game. If you think I’m making that up, I am not. My mouth just dropped. ‘We just blessed him (points up) and the next thing you know, it’s the score of the A&M football game or Baylor football game? Are you kidding me?’ That stuff is real. It’s going to be a little bit different, but they gotta come out to Tucson, Arizona as well. Last time I checked on that football field, the practice we went through right there, it can get a little hot sometimes.”
UA starting quarterback Noah Fifita throws as the Arizona offense runs some seven-on-seven drills during the Wildcats’ 2024 spring game event on April 27 at Arizona Stadium.
Arizona running backs Quali Conley and Jacory Croskey-Merritt said they refer to Fifita as ‘captain.’ After being at the UA over the last seven months, what have you seen regarding Fifita’s leadership and ability to get players to rally around him?
A: “Noah is like Sainthood. ... He’s not King Arthur, but who was King Arthur’s number one knight? Sir Lancelot? That’s who he is. He is absolutely amazing. I can’t even describe him. You start talking about him and your hair starts standing up.
“The guy is special.”
UA backup quarterback Brayden Dorman throws from the pocket during the Arizona Wildcats' 2024 spring game on April 27 at Arizona Stadium in Tucson.
Between redshirt freshman Brayden Dorman, San Jose State transfer Anthony Garcia, Northern Arizona transfer Adam Damante and walk-ons Cole Tannenbaum and Mason Bray, what’s your plan to determine Fifita’s backup?
A: “We’ve got so many of them, so we’re spacing out reps. We’re slowing down our decisions, because we’re not going to have the opportunity to go down the road and go, ‘Ah, man, we picked the wrong one,’ and we train another one.
“Slow and steady is the way with some of those guys in the back, but there’s going to come a day here really soon where we’re going to have to start making some decisions, and then we’re going to have to go with some guys. We gotta get that pocket of guys down to one guy.
“You can’t give the backup quarterback enough reps, but you sure in hell can divide the reps between other people.”
What traits do you look for in determining the backup quarterback role?
A: “I don’t know, but I hope we can do what you guys did last year. Your backup quarterback was some guy by the name of Noah Fifita. I thought that guy was a heck of a backup, but I think he was an even better starter than he was as a backup.
“If we can find something close to him, we’ll be very excited.”
