Greg Hansen: 'Mr. Football' on empty stadiums, cold-weather games — and Friday's winner

Dear Mr. Football: Has Arizona set any football records this season that don’t include consecutive losses?

A: The Wildcats drew an average of 34,901 fans at Arizona Stadium. That’s the lowest since 1972. Arizona Stadium was expanded to 57,000 capacity in 1976.

Dear Mr. Football: How popular was UA football in 1976?

A: Coming off consecutive seasons of 8-3, 9-2 and 9-2, the UA added 17,000 seats to Arizona Stadium. In an opening-night win over Auburn, a record crowd of 52,208 attended. The Star referred to it as a spectacle that seemed “like a Hollywood premier.”

Dear Mr. Football: Is UA football a hometown spectacle now?

A: Perspective: As recently as 2006, Mike Stoops’ 6-6 team set a school record by averaging 55,798 fans. Losing an average of more than 21,000 fans per game 15 years later is more of a series of Hollywood “Fright Night” movies.

Dear Mr. Football: Were UA administrators wrong to go beyond 40,000 capacity in 1976?

A: Consider this: in 1976, the population of Pima County was listed at 442,000. It is now 1.1 million. Tucson was growing as fast as any city in America. Coach Jim Young’s football program was peaking.

In ’76, the demand for in-person viewing surged in Tucson. And why not? On the day of the grand opening of the expanded Arizona Stadium, the only college football game on live television was Notre Dame-Pitt. (Arizona games were tape delayed until 11 p.m.). Only two games involving current Pac-12 teams were televised live that season: UCLA-ASU and UCLA-USC. In fact, only 19 college football regular-season games were televised during the 1976 season.

College football was a regional game. ESPN was still a crazy dream in someone’s mind. Entertainment options were limited. Bigger was better when it came to building football stadiums. Almost every Pac-12 school made the mistake of over-building its football stadium.

Dear Mr. Football: Why doesn’t Arizona raze the upper deck stands on the east side and go with a capacity of about 40,000? Wouldn’t tickets then be in demand?

A: The recent trend among Pac-12 schools is to go small. Stanford reduced its capacity from 80,000 to 50,000. Cal’s renovations eliminated 15,000 seats, to 60,000, which is still way too big. ASU dropped from 72,000 to 53,500. Even USC, which once averaged as many as 93,000 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, now seats a more modest 77,000, also too large for 21st-century interest.

While demolishing the upper deck at Arizona Stadium might, in a strange way, generate more game-day interest at the stadium, the cost might be prohibitive. The UA spent $4.8 million to expand the stadium in 1976 (about $23 million in today’s dollars) but I suspect it would cost a minimum of $25 million just to get rid of those nosebleed seats.

UA athletic director Dave Heeke estimated that COVID-19 shutdowns cost the school about $25 million. It still needs to blow up the antiquated west grandstands and rebuild about 17,000 seats there. That could go beyond $150 million.

Dear Mr. Football: Couldn’t the UA generate money by naming the field after a casino or some rich guy?

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A: Renaming Arizona Stadium wouldn’t even begin to pay for a re-do of the stadium. Washington State last year renamed its football surface “GESA Field” after a credit union. That gets the Cougars a modest $11 million over 10 years, which is less than what the UA combined to pay Rich Rodriguez and Kevin Sumlin not to coach at its school.

Cal recently renamed Memorial Stadium, accepting $17.5 million from a cryptocurrency firm over 10 years to refer to its historic facility as FTX Field at Memorial Stadium. That barely pays the yearly salaries of Cal’s offensive and defensive coordinators.

Dear Mr. Football: Why would any athletic administrator approve a freezing mid-November, Friday night game in Pullman, Washington, for a game that will be broadcast on the off-the-beaten-path Pac-12 Networks?

A: When the Pac-12 scheduled Arizona-WSU for a Friday night, it thought ESPN or Fox Sports 1 would bite. They didn’t. That means WSU fans — the school averages 24,196 at GESA Field, capacity 33,900 — will have to endure potential rain, snow (or both) and temperatures in the 30s at kickoff.

Rather than broadcast Arizona-Wazzu, ESPN chose to air an NBA doubleheader and selected the Houston-Memphis football game for ESPN2. Fox Sports 1 will broadcast the Nevada-Air Force game.

According to Jon Wilner’s Pac-12 Hotline, night games on the Pac-12 Networks often struggle to draw 100,000 viewers. When it’s Arizona-WSU? Maybe half that.

Dear Mr. Football: What’s the coldest game Arizona has played during its Pac-12 years?

A: Its Nov. 8, 1986 game at Pullman began with game-time temperature of 34 and strong winds. It snowed a day earlier; UA football players engaged in a snowball fight outside of their Lewiston, Idaho, hotel earlier that morning. But there was no snow on the field during the game. It had been plowed to the sidelines.

The old press box at Martin Stadium had a few space heaters but nothing else. It was not fully enclosed. Before kickoff, Cheryl Smith, the wife of Arizona coach Larry Smith, showed up wearing a full-length navy blue ski parka, given to all UA players, coaches and staff.

She saw me shivering, under-dressed, blowing on my hands so that I could type and take notes. Cheryl went to the field and got me a UA ski parka. I told her I couldn’t wear it because of the, shall we say, journalistic code. No gifts, especially from the coach’s wife. She dropped it on my lap and said “are you nuts?” Let’s just say I stayed warm during UA’s 31-6 win.

Dear Mr. Football: Is Jedd Fisch a good cold-weather coach?

A: Fisch has an amazing memory. I asked him if he had coached in any epic cold weather games and he correctly listed two games without hesitation.

The most chilling was an NFL Monday Night Game, Dec. 19, 2005, when Fisch was on the Baltimore Ravens staff. It was 29 degrees at kickoff with a windchill of 19 degrees. The Ravens routed Green Bay 48-3 that night in Baltimore.

That Ravens team included future Hall of Famers Deion Sanders, Ray Lewis, Ed Reed, Jonathan Ogden and the best cornerback in Arizona history, Chris McAlister. In the cold at GESA Stadium, Fisch won’t have those players to help keep him and his team warm and operating at full efficiency.

Cougars 31, Wildcats 18.