The Star's longtime columnist Greg Hansen checks in with college football's recent surge in Name, Image and Likeness deals and how Arizona football must navigate it. Plus, a documentary on Annika Sorenstam debuts and former UA star Sam Thomas making the Phoenix Mercury's opening day roster.
Two weeks ago, the football programs of Arizona and Texas found common ground where you’d least expect it: Neither the Longhorns nor Wildcats had a player selected in the NFL Draft.
That’s fully out of character for Texas, which has had 16 first-round draft picks this century compared to Arizona’s two, the smallest number in the Pac-12. In retrospect, it’s easily explained: Texas went 5-7, losing six straight games in 2021.
But it won’t be long until Texas is back in the NFL draft business: Longhorns running back Bijan Robinson of Salpointe Catholic High School is strongly considered a first-round draftee in 2023. Even though the Longhorns struggled last season, Robinson became a full-blown celebrity in Austin, Texas, unlike few in college football.
A college sports website On3.com, estimates that Robinson is being paid $350,000 via Names, Image and Likeness ventures. So far, Robinson has signed six endorsement deals, the latest with an Austin Lamborghini dealership. That follows Robinson’s previous deals with Raising Canes; C4 Energy; DAZN, a sports streaming operation; Centre, an athletic apparel company based in Dallas; and Cameo, a celebrity video message group.
Texas Longhorns star and Tucson native Bijan Robinson announced on Thursday his partnership with a Lamborghini dealership in Austin, Texas.
For Arizona to be competitive in Pac-12 football — to produce another long-awaited first-round draft pick — it must find its own version of DAZN and Lamborghini in Southern Arizona. If you examine the UA’s seven first-round draft picks of the Pac-10/12 years, it mostly was blessed with football serendipity rather than plucking five-star recruits away from Top-25 powerhouses. Here’s how Arizona acquired its seven first-round NFL draft picks:
Ricky Hunley, 1984: The Virginia linebacker chose Arizona over Notre Dame and Ohio State because he liked the winter weather here, was fortunate to have a relative living in Sierra Vista and was promised a chance to play baseball for the Wildcats.
Anthony Smith, 1989: The Parade All-American defensive end from North Carolina had academic difficulties after three years at Alabama and transferred to Arizona because of a relationship he had built with former ’Bama offensive coordinator Rip Scherer, who had been hired as Arizona’s offensive coordinator. Smith sat out a year, attending classes at Pima College.
Chris Singleton, 1989: A linebacker from New Jersey, Singleton and his twin brother, Kevin, committed to Arizona in a package deal, eschewing offers from Notre Dame a few years after Arizona beat the undefeated Fighting Irish, and had been ranked No. 3 nationally. Good timing.
John Fina. 1991: The Salpointe lineman and basketball player wasn’t even the No. 1 prospect in Tucson in the Class of ‘86, ranking behind Amphi’s Marion Bates, Sunnyside QB Bobby Valdez and Santa Rita’s Sean Cook. But the bright, hard-working Fina went from 220 pounds to 280 pounds as a Wildcat and built himself into a 12-year NFL veteran.
Chris McAlister, 1989: A legacy recruit to UCLA where his father, James McAlister, was the nation’s best long-jumper and an all-conference running back, McAlister had academic difficulties enrolling at UCLA. After a year at a SoCal junior college, McAlister created a bond with Dick Tomey, who had been his father’s early 1970s coach at UCLA.
Trung Canidate, 2001: He played on a 2-8, inner-city Phoenix Central High team that had just 19 players and was not considered at the same level of White Mountain recruits Scooter Sprotte and Marcus Bell when signing in the same class, 1995. But by his junior year at Arizona, Candidate had been switched from defensive back to tailback where he became a Bijan Robinson-type talent.
Antoine Cason, 2008: A three-star cornerback at Los Alamitos High in SoCal, Cason was a legacy recruit at Oregon, where his father, NFL cornerback Wendell Cason, had built himself into an NFL player. But the Ducks passed on Cason, who chose to sign with a 2-10 Arizona team transitioning from John Mackovic to Mike Stoops. Cason’s other offers were Washington State and Cal.
What’s encouraging about Arizona’s football future is that coach Jedd Fisch and his staff have not been intimidated by recruiting elite prospects such as receiver Tetairoa McMillan from heavyweight power Anaheim Servite, getting him away from Oregon.
Tetairoa McMillan answers questions from reporters during a news conference last week. McMillian, a Southern California wide receiver, is the highest-rated recruit to ever sign with the Wildcats.
McMillan hasn’t yet signed to represent a big-name car dealership or local fast-food power. But to sign, develop and deliver its next first-round NFL draft pick, or any draft pick — Arizona hasn’t had a football player selected in five of the last 10 drafts — it seems like the only way to go is to build a productive NIL collective.
Counting on “getting lucky’’ again with a John Fina or a Chris McAlister isn’t reasonable.
McConnell award ceremony to honor Castillo
In 2000, Tucson’s boys prep basketball community began awarding the city’s top coach with the Dick McConnell Award. Deservedly, McConnell, the 39-year Sahuaro High School coach who won a state record 776 games over 39 seasons, was honored in 2000 and 2001.
Wednesday night at Gentle Ben’s on the UA campus, Salpointe Catholic’s first-year coach, Eric Castillo, will be presented with the McConnell Coach of the Year Award. Castillo’s Lancers went 26-3, finishing No. 2 in Class 4A.
Salpointe Lancers's head coach Eric Castillo has a moment to talk to guard Julian Riesgo (1) in the third quarter against the Deer Valley Skyhawks in the state 4A semifinal boys basketball game at Salpointe Catholic High School, Tucson, Ariz., February 22, 2022.
The McConnell award has a prestigious history. It was presented to Amphi’s Ben Hurley in 2009, 2011 and 2012 during a time Amphi averaged 27 wins a year and won a state championship. Catalina Foothills’ Doug D’Amore has since won the McConnell award three times, with Cholla’s Masai Dean, Santa Rita’s Jim Ferguson and Salpointe’s Brian Holstrom and Jim Reynolds winning twice.
The beauty of the McConnell Award is that it hasn’t just honored coaches from schools with great resources. Rincon/University’s Rich Utter, Catalina’s John Brown, Amphi’s Pat Derksen and Tucson High’s Gary Lewis have also been recognized.
Sorenstam documentary debuts Tuesday
The life and career of Arizona’s 1991 NCAA championship golfer Annika Sorenstam will be examined in the documentary, “Becoming Annika,” which will debut Tuesday at 6 p.m. Tucson time on Golf Channel.
Sorenstam won 90 professional tournaments after leaving Tucson, most ever by a female golfer. She won 10 majors and is the only woman to shoot a 59 in competition.
The USGA backed the project because it wanted to invest in telling stories about women’s golf. As fate would have it, Sorenstam came out of a 13-year retirement last year to win the U.S. Senior Women’s Open. That gave her an exemption into the 2022 U.S. Women’s Open, which will be held early next month.
The timing of the Golf Channel documentary is such that the NCAA has been slow to move women’s golf to the same level as men’s golf. At the NCAA championships that begin this week — Laura Ianello’s Wildcats are part of the NCAA regional field in Albuquerque — only 24 women’s teams will advance to the championship finals later this month in Scottsdale. The NCAA awards 30 men’s team berths in the championship finals.
And it’s not like women’s college golf is in its infancy. There are currently 268 women’s NCAA Division 1 teams. Perhaps Sorenstam’s documentary will accelerate the NCAA into giving equal opportunity to women’s golf programs.
Brauner hits it big
Before Henry Brauner became the vice president of player development for the Seattle Sounders of the MLS, he was a standout soccer player at Sabino High and for coach Dave Cosgrove at Pima College. After completing his education, Brauner enrolled in medical school but the appeal of soccer was in his blood.
He returned to Tucson, worked in youth soccer organizations, for FC Tucson and the USA national team. He climbed the ladder until he ultimately became a key operative in the Real Salt Lake MLS organization. He landed with the Sounders, where he has been active on the international soccer scene in recruiting and development.
Last week, Brauner experienced a career high. Before a Seattle crowd of 68,000, the Sounders won the CONCACAF North American Club Championship, one of the elite American victories in global soccer history. Seattle is the first MLS club in history to do so.
The Sounders will be the first to represent MLS at the FIFA Club World Cup next year in Dubai. The tournament features the host nation’s domestic champion plus the winners of AFC (Asia), CAF (Africa), CONCACAF (North and Central America), CONMEBOL (South America), OFC (Oceania) and UEFA (Europe), all vying to be named world champions.
Mercury was wise to place faith in Thomas
Sam Thomas has made the Phoenix Mercury roster.
Sam Thomas did not make the All-Pac-12 women’s basketball team in her Arizona days and was not selected in the WNBA Draft. But she established her place in UA sports history by being a dominant defensive player, a low-maintenance, team-first athlete much like ex-Wildcats Jud Buechler and T.J. McConnell, who reached the NBA and made a place for themselves by thriving in whatever role assigned. After Thomas, a free agent, made her WNBA debut for the Phoenix Mercury on Friday — she played eight minutes — it became clear to see why she will be an asset for the Mercury. She doesn’t strut, pose, flex or demean opponents, which is becoming more and more a part of NBA basketball. Watch Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant or his teammate Dillon Brooks and you’ll know what I’m saying. Thomas plays with passion but with a demeanor similar to those like Mike Trout, Tom Brady and Steph Curry do. She puts her head down and plays hard.
Before Thomas, there was Tim Derksen, Amphitheater High School’s 2012 Arizona Gatorade basketball player of the year. He was a selfless, team-first player who led resources-challenged Amphi to the 2011 state championship. Last week, Derksen was selected to France EuroLeague’s five-man all-star team by a vote of the Pro B League coaches. Derksen is averaging 16 points and shooting 62% for the Antibes Sharks as they near the 2022 playoffs.
Babers helps continue Tomey's legacy
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.
When Arizona completed its historic 12-1 football season of 1998, its offensive coordinator was Dino Babers, a humble young coach who had risen through the ranks as an assistant coach for Dick Tomey at Hawaii and later at NAU, Arizona State, UNLV and San Diego State. Now the head coach at Syracuse, Babers last week raised $10,000 for the Dick Tomey Legacy Fund and the Positive Coaching Alliance, which is operated in Arizona by Rich Tomey, Dick’s son. Babers was one of 22 college football head coaches playing for a share of $330,000 in an annual coaching benefit tournament in Atlanta.
Former UA assistant finds home in high school coaching
After three failed years as Arizona’s offensive coordinator under Kevin Sumlin, Noel Mazzone found work as an offensive analyst at UConn and for the USFL’s New Orleans Breakers. Once the USFL season is over, Mazzone, 65, will return to Arizona and be the offensive coordinator at Gilbert’s Higley High School. The man who coached NFL quarterbacks Josh Rosen at UCLA and Philip Rivers at N.C. State, will be working for a team that has gone 6-13 the last two seasons, but Mazzone knows what he’s getting into. Higley’s sophomore-to-be QB is Jamar Malone, who has already been offered scholarships by Arizona’s Jedd Fisch and Pac-12 rivals Oregon, Washington and WSU. The QB Mazzone hoped would turn Arizona’s program around, Grant Gunnell, is looking for work. After transferring from Arizona to Memphis, Gunnell is now in the transfer portal for a second time.
Ianello's success story
Denise Dove Ianello arrived on the UA campus in 1993 as Joan Bonvicini’s young assistant coach with a struggling women’s basketball program. Ianello became a recruiting star; she helped to sign Adia Barnes, a young prospect from San Diego, and help the Wildcats to their first-ever NCAA Tournament. Dove married UA assistant football coach Rob Ianello, who lost his job during Arizona’s change of head coaches in 2000. The Ianellos moved to Notre Dame, Kansas, Buffalo and Akron. Denise continued to coach — boys high school basketball — and last week her oldest son, Zach Ianello, signed a scholarship to play basketball at Nebraska Wesleyan University. The Ianellos now live in Lawrence, Kansas, where Rob is an assistant coach for the Jayhawks.
My two cents: Tucson continues to support Roadrunners
Roadrunners captain Hudson Fasching, left, battles in front of the San Diego net in Friday’s 3-2 shootout victory over the Gulls. The 26-year-old scored his 14th goal to extend Tucson’s lead to 2-0 late in the second period.
With its last three AHL seasons affected by COVID-19, the Tucson Roadrunners were still able to draw 121,174 fans this season at the Tucson Arena. That’s an average of 3,584 per game. As the season progressed, the Roadrunners drew crowds of 5,410 and 5,196 in April.
The Roadrunners outdrew eight AHL clubs — Hartford, Rockford, Manitoba, Bridgeport, Toronto, San Jose, Stockton and Bellevue. It’s a promising sign that after three years of adversity, the fan base for pro hockey in Tucson is hanging tough.
