The last time a TV network (Fox) unwisely scheduled an Arizona day game in a still-too-hot, summer-is-hanging-on part of the football calendar was Sept. 18, 2004.
The 11 a.m. kickoff against powerful Wisconsin at Arizona Stadium didn’t scare off Tucsonans: 50,274 tickets were sold. The high temperature prediction was 91 degrees.
Alas, the football gods (and remnants of Hurricane Javier) gave the No. 20 Badgers a break. It rained. It poured. The game was delayed 88 minutes. Mike Stoops‘ first Arizona team should’ve won on a last-second, 47-yard field goal attempt by future NFL star Nick Folk. A combination of wind and rain blew Folk’s kick off path, missing by inches. Wisconsin won 9-7.
Compare that to Saturday’s 41-13 victory over a hapless Oklahoma State team. The temperature was near 90. There was little or no shade. It felt like 100.
An early-arriving fan walks through the nearly empty stands in the ZonaZoo student section 90 minutes before kickoff of the Wildcats’ game against Oklahoma State, Oct. 4, 2025, at Arizona Stadium.
Arizona announced attendance as 40,685, but there were probably 15,000 no-shows. Did it matter? Not a bit. It should’ve been a lesson to Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark that you don’t schedule day games before November in Tucson, no matter how many available TV windows need to be filled. It’s not fair to the fan base. And it’s not good for Arizona’s image; imagine all those who turned on TNT Saturday and saw all those empty seats.
As beneficial as winning a football game, any football game, is for Arizona’s psyche, the blow to its this-isn’t-a-football school reputation got a punch in the gut.
Arizona has played in a handful of dreadfully hot road games through the years. The 2022 opener at San Diego State, a rare 95 degrees in that normally the-weather-is-perfect city, was miserable. (Arizona won 38-20.) But nothing topped the UA’s 1998 game at Penn State, a game Dick Tomey referred to as “the hottest game I’ve ever experienced.”
The No. 4 Wildcats were blown out 41-7 by the No. 3 Nittany Lions that day, a 1 p.m. start. Temperatures reached 88 degrees as 91,168 fans sat in unforgiving humidity. Arizona collapsed, finishing 6-6, signaling the end to Tomey’s UA days.
Fortunately, Saturday’s game against the Cowboys didn’t cause any long-term damage to the UA’s football program. But please, Commissioner Yormark, no more day games in October.
