Arizona star Tacario Davis 'just scratching the surface' as elite cornerback

Exploring options can lead one to a different destination. Or it could bring them back to Point A.

Arizona cornerback Tacario Davis flirted with leaving the program after his second season with the Wildcats and entered the transfer portal following the departure of Jedd Fisch and his staff to Washington.

Davis is the type of cornerback that teams yearn for in the transfer portal: an uber-productive ballhawk with a 6-4, 195-pound frame — similar to a high-level basketball shooting guard — who excels in pass coverage.

Unlike his other UA teammates who were a part of Arizona’s 10-3 season in 2023 that was capped with an Alamo Bowl win, Davis didn’t disclose his plans for the upcoming year. There wasn’t a sizzle video played at McKale Center during a timeout break at a basketball game, or a social media post. He stayed silent and mulled his options.

Then he returned to Point A.

Davis is back with the Wildcats as a veteran on a defense that’s returning a majority of its defensive starters from ’23, including four defensive backs along with nickel back Treydan Stukes, strong safety Dalton Johnson and free safety Gunner Maldonado. Davis’ cornerback counterpart, Ephesians Prysock, followed Fisch to UW.

Davis said he returned to Arizona to “just to give the new coaches a shot.”

“I didn’t just want to hop in (the transfer portal) and not know (anything),” Davis said. “I’m just giving them a chance, because everybody stayed together for the team. I just wanted to be a part of something special, stay together, stick around and see what it’s about.”

Since Davis was inserted into the starting lineup in Arizona’s road opener at Mississippi State, he “probably had the most growth last season, from the first game to the last game,” Stukes said.

“He’s got all the physical tools and he’s just getting smarter and smarter as a football player,” Stukes said. “It’s going to be great help to have a dominant corner like that. ... A lot of times corners get put in that athlete position where they don’t think you’re that smart. He took the mental side of the game very seriously and we could all tell and see it in his play.“

Davis led the Pac-12 in pass breakups (15), albeit several of them were close to being interceptions.

“That frustrated me,” Davis said. “That still haunts me to this day. I just gotta put it to the side, just keep working and know I gotta do more ball drills after practice.”

Davis, who also became the first Wildcat since 2002 to return a blocked field goal for a touchdown, was named to the Associated Press All-Pac-12 second team and emerged as one of the top cornerbacks nationally.

Having Davis back in Arizona’s secondary “is huge,” said UA head coach Brent Brennan.

“He’s a player that really emerged last year and you got see him really start to accelerate his development, and I thought that was really, really cool,” Brennan said of Davis. “It’s rare when you have a group of guys that’s as close as they are here. ... Those guys are so close and being able to play at the level he wants to play at and the consistency he wants to perform at, being in the back end with people who you’ve done it with before and you know where they’re going to be and you trust each other, it’s a huge part of it.“

Brennan noted “the communication on defense has been awesome” in Arizona’s spring practices.

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“Nobody is too cool to talk,” said Brennan. “Everyone is talking the whole time. That’s the comfort he has with Stukes and Dalton and Gunner and (Jai-Ayviauynn Celestine) and all the other guys he’s played with over the years.”

Davis’ decision to stay at Arizona, as Fisch often said in Tucson, became personal. His new position coach, Arizona cornerbacks coach Courtney “Chip” Viney, played and coached under DeWayne Walker, the man who recruited Davis to Arizona, at UCLA and New Mexico State, when Walker was the defensive coordinator for the Bruins before becoming head coach at NMSU. Walker was Arizona’s cornerbacks coach for two seasons under Fisch before leaving the program after the 2022 season. He recruited Davis out of Milikan High School in Long Beach, California, for Arizona’s loaded ’22 class that includes quarterback Noah Fifita, wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan, offensive linemen Jonah Savaiinaea and Wendell Moe, linebacker Jacob Manu and defensive lineman Ta’ita’i Uiagalelei.

Walker’s relationship with Viney played “a little bit” of a role in keeping Davis in Tucson.

“(Walker) was telling me some good things about Coach Chip, and my high school coach knows Chip, so he was (also) telling me good things about Chip,” Davis said of Viney, who garnered the nickname Chip through members of UCLA’s strength and conditioning staff for “having a chip on my shoulder” while he was a player.

“You could tell there are some similarities” between Viney and Walker, added Davis.

Since Viney was one of the last additions on Brennan’s staff, “we’ve had great conversations” about Davis’ development in potentially his last year as a college football player since he’ll be eligible for the NFL Draft next year.

“Tacario loves this place, loves his teammates in the locker room and he wants to be here. That’s where his decision lies,” Viney said. “But I get it, I’m coming through the door and doesn’t know me from the next man on the street. ‘Give me an opportunity to show you who I am and what I’m about this spring. You owe it to yourself. You want to be here and I want you here.’”

Davis’ admiration for his teammates made it “a locker-room decision more than anything for those guys to stay together.”

“We have a lot of personal young men who know what they want and have a chip on their shoulder for how things went,” said Viney, who is Davis’ third cornerbacks coach at Arizona. “I think that’s what ultimately kept the group together, along with Coach Brennan being who he is. ... A lot of these things can become very transactional, but who Brennan is as a man first and that’s the thing that flows over him as a coach.”

Plus, the ultimate goal is to reach the NFL. What’s better training for the next level than matching up with arguably the top receiver in college football and likely first-round pick in McMillan?

“It prepares me a lot because, in my eyes, he’s a first-round guy, so going up against him every day is going up against one of the best receivers in the country,” said Davis, who was nicknamed “Bobo” by his siblings at 2 years old.

The only change Davis this spring is his jersey number, switching from 23 to 1, a sacred number given to team captains during the Fisch regime. A navy blue UA jersey, a leftover from the Fisch era, is currently framed above the Davis Indoor Sports Center doors with a “TBD” nameplate at the bottom. “To be determined” has now been replaced by Tacario “Bobo” Davis.

“I was tired of 23. I had to get to a single-digit (number), but I still rock with (23) though,” he said.

With a new number, Davis is prepared to lead an Arizona secondary and stack on his sophomore season and bloom into a draft pick.

“He’s what everyone in the country is looking for. Long, can run and cover, and I think he’s got a lot of potential,” Viney said. “He’s just scratching the surface. He’s got a lot ahead of him, and that’s what I talked to him about: continuing that development and transformation of the foundation he’s already laid.

“Sky’s the limit for Tacario. He’s a worker. On the outside looking in, a lot of things can be said. He’s a guy that wants to be here and he loves this place. He’s putting his best foot forward to transform into the elite player that he can be.”