The Star's longtime columnist on Bijan vs. Ka'Deem ... Heather Moore-Martin's sustained excellence ... UA softball's (somewhat) historic losing streak ... rising basketball recruits with local connections ... UA tennis' facility challenge ... and more.
Breakaway back: The case for Bijan over Ka'Deem
If there is anything such as recency bias in sports, it might apply to a comparison between two of the most prolific high school football players in Tucson history, Salpointeβs Bijan Robinson and Canyon del Oroβs KaβDeem Carey.
Robinson, this yearβs No. 8 overall NFL Draft pick, seems poised for greatness, a long and prosperous career in which he becomes one of pro footballβs identifiable personalities.
But if you compare the pre-NFL careers of Robinson and Carey, you can make a strong case that Carey had better college production. The numbers back it up:
In three years at Arizona, 2011-13, Carey rushed for 4,239 yards and caught 77 passes for 679 yards, with 52 total touchdowns. Total offense: 4,918.
In three years at Texas, 2020-22, Robinson rushed for 3,410 yards and caught 60 passes for 805 yards, with 41 total touchdowns. Total offense: 4,215.
Advantage: Carey.
Carey played on UA teams that went 16-10 his final two seasons. Robinson played on Texas teams that were 13-12 his last two seasons. Carey was a consensus All-American in both 2012 and 2013; Robinson was a consensus All-American in 2022. Again, advantage Carey.
Carey finished 10th in the Heisman Trophy balloting in 2013; Robinson finished No. 9 last season.
Both are about the same size, 5 feet 11 and 210 pounds. Yet Carey was not drafted until the fourth round, No. 117 overall, 109 spots behind Robinson. What is the difference in their NFL value?
I found several of Careyβs 2014 draft profiles, and hereβs what they said he lacked:
βCan be taken down by arm tackles β¦ goes down on first contact β¦ acceleration speed is averageΒ ... runs standing up, compromising his power β¦ will not do much as a receiver β¦ below-average awareness in pass protection."
By comparison, Robinsonβs NFL draft profiles had almost no negatives. They said, in part:
βRips through leg tackles β¦ runs low to ground β¦ rarely loses balance on first contact β¦ has footwork to alter direction with power β¦ exceptional pass-receiver instincts β¦ needs more urgency in pass protection."
The differences between the two running backs are substantial, and NFL scouts learned much of that on each playerβs pro days and during extensive film evaluations. Carey was timed in a slower-than-usual 4.69 for 40 yards. Robinson blazed through 40 yards in 4.46. Robinsonβs vertical jump was 37 inches; Careyβs was 32.
Although he had more prolific numbers in college than Bijan Robinson, Arizona's Ka'Deem Carey, above, lasted till the fourth round of the draft and didn't thrive in the NFL. But his work ethic has made him a star in the CFL with the Calgary Stampeders.
In the end, the NFL scouts were correct about Carey. He started just one game in three NFL seasons, rushing for 443 career yards.
The most positive pre-draft profile item I found on Carey from 2014 was this: βHe gets by by being a hard worker." That, too, was correct. Perhaps thatβs why, at 30, Carey has persevered to become an all-star in the Canadian Football League, leading the CFL in regular-season rushing in 2022.
About the only thing I can say with certainty is that Robinson and Carey are among the 11 leading running backs in Tucson history, an impressive list that also proves a running backβs football life is unpredictable:
- Hayzel Daniels, Tucson High, 1920s. Did not play college football.
- Joe Batiste, Tucson High, 1930s. Became a world-class track star.
- Joel Favara, Tucson High, 1950s. Became an all-conference player at Oklahoma State.
- Vance Johnson, Cholla, 1970s. Caught 415 passes for 5,695 yards with the Denver Broncos.
- David Adams, Sunnyside, 1980s. Became an All-Pac-10 player at Arizona.
- Jon Volpe, Amphitheater, 1980s. Became a 1,000-yard rusher at Stanford.
- Michael Bates, Amphitheater, 1980s. Became a five-time NFL Pro Bowl special-teams player.
- Mario Bates, Amphitheater, 1990s. Gained 3,048 yards in seven NFL seasons.
- Kevin Schmidtke, Mountain View, 1990s. Gained 774 yards at Arizona.
Salpointe Catholic High School's Heather Moore-Martin, shown in November 2015, has won nine state titles and counting, including three in a row as head coach of the Lancers' beach volleyball team.
Moore-Martin at 9 state titlesΒ β and counting
Heather Moore-Martin began her remarkable state championship run in 2010, coaching the Catalina High School boys volleyball team to the first of two consecutive titles. An encore? She coached Salpointe Catholicβs girls volleyball team to 2016, 2017 and 2020 state championships.
Then came an unexpected three-peat. Moore-Martin, the founder of girls high school beach volleyball in Tucson, has now coached the Lancers to three consecutive beach volleyball state championships.
The 1985 Catalina High School grad is not finished.
βI honestly would love to start a boys beach volleyball program," she said after winning state title No. 9 Wednesday. βI could see myself transitioning to boys beach volleyball."
It is a run of success almost unmatched in 100 years of Tucson prep sports, rivaling those of Tucson Highβs pre-1950s baseball and track coaches Hank Slagle and Doc Van Horne, Sunnyside wrestling coaches Don Klostreich and Bobby DeBerry, and Catalina Foothills girls tennis coach Kristie Stevens.
βWe started (girls beach volleyball) eight years ago, and we were the only team in TucsonΒ β we played many, many road games in Phoenix," she remembers. βThen (coach) Bill Lang got it going at Ironwood Ridge, and pretty soon Amphi, CDO, Mountain View, Marana and Cienega stepped up. The TUSD schools are still holding out. They could build one facility to host all of their events. It would be very popular. Itβs the most fun sport Iβve ever coached. The girls just love it."
Salpointeβs girls beach volleyball program, which is 50-1 the last three seasons, has attracted the attention of Pac-12 schools. Lancer junior standout Megan Muehlebach, Class of 2024, has committed to play for Oregon, and Arizona starters Alex Parkhurst and Abby Russell were Salpointe state champs in 2019.
Arizona left fielder Dakota Kennedy, right, just misses coming up with the catch in front of shortstop Tayler Biehl on a looper by Oregon Stateβs Kaiea Higa that drove home the Beaversβ final run in the seventh inning of their Pac-12 softball game at Hillenbrand Stadium on Friday, April 28, 2023.
Arizona softball skid has company
When coach Caitlin Loweβs UA softball team lost its 14th consecutive Pac-12 game Friday, it put the Wildcats in undesirable (and historic) territory.
The longest conference losing streak in UA sports history is surely out of reach. It is 0 for 32, set by Wildcat womenβs basketball teams of 1980-83 when Arizona played in the Western Collegiate Conference.
The UA womenβs volleyball teams of 1991-92 lost 25 consecutive Pac-10 matches. Arizonaβs womenβs basketball teams of 2013-14 lost 16 straight Pac-12 games.
But until now, the losing streak that got the most (unwanted) attention was coach Ben Lindseyβs 1982-83 menβs basketball team. In the lost year between Fred Snowden and Lute Olson, Lindseyβs Wildcats lost 14 straight Pac-10 games.
An immediate concern for Arizonaβs softball team is to avoid the play-in game in the upcoming Pac-12 Tournament at Hillenbrand Stadium. The Nos. 8-9 seeds will play a loser-goes-home game on May 10. Thatβs bad enough. But the winner will then be bracketed against No. 1 UCLA a day later.
Puebloβs Sandra Perez, right, picks up a foul reaching in for a steal from Salpointeβs Taliyah Henderson in the fourth quarter of their state playoff game at Salpointe Catholic High School on Feb. 7, 2023.
Short stuff: UA target Skinner's connections, Salpointe's Henderson's rise, Berryhill's expensive misstep
Small-world department: Arizona womenβs basketball coach Adia Barnes scouted the Heart of Texas showcase last week and shortly afterward offered a scholarship to Class of 2025 point guard Emilee Skinner, who mightβve been the No. 1 prospect in the three-day showcase.
Skinner plays at Ridgeline High School in Logan, Utah, where my brother, Mike Hansen, is the athletic director. She was Utahβs 2023 Player of the Year, leading the Riverhawks to an undefeated state championship.
Arizona was the first Power Five school to offer Skinner, a 5-foot-11 combo guard, a scholarship. But within 48 hours, Skinner had been discovered, offered multiple scholarships by top-25 schools. She has Arizona connections: her father, Erik, a golf pro in Logan, played basketball at Eastern Arizona College, and her mother, Deana, grew up in Pinetop. ...
β’Β β’Β β’Β
... Salpointe basketball player Taliyah Henderson has emerged as one of the leading girls basketball prospects in Tucson history, a select group with 1980s Santa Rita guard Paula Pyers and 2003 Salpointe grad Sybil Dosty.
In the same Heart of Texas showcase last week, Henderson scored 24 points, including the game-winning basket, over the Jason Kidd Select team of Texas. Her Arizona Select team, based in Phoenix, gained national exposure in five weekend games.
Henderson, a 6-1 wing forward with terrific ball-handling skills, is the defending state 800-meter track champion. Since the Texas event, Henderson has been offered scholarships by Arizona, Michigan, Harvard, Florida, Louisville, Illinois and Boston College, among others. Final Four power Iowa had previously offered Henderson a spot in the Hawkeyesβ program. ...
β’Β β’Β β’Β
... Former Arizona receiver and special teams performer Stanley Berryhill of Mountain View High School signed a one-year, $870,000 non-guaranteed reserve/future contract to remain on the Detroit Lions roster in January. He played in four games with one tackle for the Lions in 2022.
Now that he has been suspended six games for allegedly betting on non-NFL games while in the Lionsβ compound, his future becomes uncertain. He is likely to be used for practice depth before training camp begins this summer. According to the Lions, Berryhill will forfeit $290,000 for time missed.
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... The three Pac-12 football referees poached by the Big Ten this offseason are significant losses. Crew chiefs Francisco Villar, Steve Strimling and Chris Coyte are the equivalent of elite-level Pac-12 basketball referees Tony Padilla, John Higgins and Verne Harris.
During the 2022 season, Villar was the crew chief of Arizona games against San Diego State, Washington State and Washington. Strimling was the crew chief for UA games against Colorado and ASU. Coyte was the crew chief at the UA-Oregon game. Replacing them with comparable experience and ability is unlikely anytime soon.
Arizona men's tennis coach Clancy Shields has built a top-25 program despite the UA not having a top-25 facility.
UA tennis center dwarfed by Pac-12 rivals
When No. 2 seed Arizona was eliminated from the Pac-12 menβs tennis championships Friday by third-seeded Utah, it couldβve been called an upset. But UA coach Clancy ShieldsβΒ team begins each year and each recruiting season at a deficit.
Maybe losing to the No. 19 Utes wasnβt an upset at all, based on the teams' financial commitment to tennis.
Arizonaβs Robson Tennis Center is a useful facility, standard-issue, but it doesnβt compare to Utahβs Eccles Tennis Center, which has the Pac-12βs best combination of indoor/outdoor courts, seating more than 1,500.
The Eccles Center, built for $20 million, has since had a $2.5 million upgrade with plans to renovate locker rooms, playersβ lounges and coachesβ offices, adding cameras for live video streaming, a Hall of Fame and team recognition area; and installing lights for the outdoor courts. Estimated cost: $5 million.
The Pac-12 is blessed with elite tennis facilities. Stanford, UCLA and USC have all played host to NCAA Championships through the years.
UCLAβs tennis center played host to the 1984 Olympics and seats 3,000. Stanfordβs Taube Tennis Center seats 3,500. USCβs Marks Stadium was remodeled in 2015 with new suites and lockers.
Arizonaβs Robson Center now has locker rooms on site, but in my tours of Pac-12 campuses, it doesnβt rank in the top five. Even rain-plagued Washington has a far superior compound, with the elite Nordstrom Tennis Center (six indoor courts) and the Quinlan Stadium (six outdoor courts).
Somehow, Shields has turned Arizona into a certifiable top-25 menβs tennis program without a top-25 facility.
There wasn't nearly as much fanfare when Arizona's Mike Dawson, right, shown vs. ASU in 1974, was a first-round pick in the 1976 NFL Draft.
My two cents: Draft has changed since Dawson's day
How the NFL Draft has changed since Tucson High and UA defensive lineman Mike Dawson was a first-round selection, No. 22 overall, in the 1976 draft:
In β76, there was no ESPN, which last week showcased Tucsonan Bijan Robinson in Kansas City before and after his first-round selection.
On draft day, Dawson awoke at 6 a.m. in his Tucson apartment. He had been married five days earlier to his Tucson High sweetheart, Bernadette. Nervous, Dawson left home at 7:30 and played a round of golf at Randolph North. When he returned to his apartment, a dozen of his teammates and his wife waited by the phone, hoping an NFL general manager would soon call with news of Dawsonβs selection.
Bernadette went to the store to buy a bottle of champagne to celebrate his selection.
βI have no doubts at all about making it in the pros," Dawson told a Tucson reporter.
He was correct. Dawson started 90 NFL games over nine seasons before returning to Tucson in the β80s to open a sports bar on Oracle Road. Cheers.
With Alabamaβs Bryce Young a virtual lock at No. 1 to the Carolina Panthers, who will go second to the Houston Texans? What about the rest of the top five?
