Not even Sheriff Lute owned the Territory like this.
Photo by Val Cañez/Tucson Citizen

Some fans want their biggest rival to be really good so there can be more at stake when the teams play. They want both teams to be playing for conference championships, high tournament seeds and elite bowl games.

Not me.

I want one-sided dominance in the rivalry. The game means something every time, in and of itself. So when ASU is down, I want them way down. I want my guys to be the best and their guys to be the worst.

In other words, what we have right now.

If you’re wondering how things have been going for ASU, take your current feelings about Arizona Basketball and turn them upside down. As the Wildcats and Sun Devils prepare to do battle on the hardwood you may have noticed there’s a slight gap between the two teams in the standings. And by “slight” I mean “as huge as possible.”

Arizona is in 1st place. Arizona State is in last place. It doesn’t get any better than that.

Has it ever happened before? Has one school ever held all the bragging cards in this great state of ours?

The worst ASU ever finished during Arizona’s 11 Pac-10 championship seasons was 7th and the Sun Devils did it three times: 1988, ’89 and ’90. The UA’s best finish during ASU’s three 10th-place seasons was 3rd in both 2004 and ’07.

It’s not a surprise that the Devils’ two biggest positive-gap years occurred pre-Lute Olson. ASU was #2 in the conference compared to Arizona’s 6th in 1980 and Arizona State finished tied for 3rd during the Ben Lindsey debacle in 1983 that led to the Cats’ only dead-last Pac-10 finish.

In football it’s interesting that for both sides the biggest gap during the Pac-10 era happened under the current coaches. Dennis Erickson led ASU to a 1st place tie in 2007 while the Wildcats finished in 6th. Mike Stoops produced the biggest standings difference when the UA finished tied for 2nd in 2009 compared to the Devils’ 9th place finish.

So this basketball season has the chance to become historic stuff. Just in case the Cats needed some extra incentive for Sunday.

For the record, forget the record; ASU can absolutely win this game. The Sun Devils have been competitive in their last four games. This will be their biggest home crowd since…the last UA game. ASU won it’s “bowl game” in Tucson this year. Can the basketball team win their version of the Final Four? If the Wildcats want history they’ll have to earn it.

Sean Miller has the chance to do something Lute never accomplished. Arizona in 1st, ASU in last.

Excuse me while I go stare at the standings and smile.

- – - – -

Scott Terrell may be trying to mask unresolved issues following the football loss. Join in the group session on Twitter and Facebook.

“Yo, O, you going to lend a hand around here?”
Photo by Chris Morrison/US Presswire

As you were watching the Oregon/Stanford game what was running through your mind?

A) Both these teams stink. Arizona can start engraving the trophy now.

B) Looks like a couple more 10-9 games are coming.

C) Luck a Duck… The Cats might have to score 60 to beat these guys!

Yes, the Wildcat defense is better than expected. Some are even calling it the best in the league. But nobody is going to completely shut down the Ducks and Cardinal. The Arizona D played Oregon as well as anyone in the Pac-10 last year and still needed 31 points just to get to overtime. Stanford dropped 38 on the Cats. And both those games were at Arizona Stadium.

There’s no getting around it: the Wildcats are going to have to score a lot of points if they want to remain a contender in this conference.

Can they?

From the spring game, all through training camp and after the Toledo and Citadel games the answer would have been a resounding yes. The 34 points against Iowa look impressive but the defense and special teams did the bulk of the lifting. Then we all saw what happened against Cal.

Anyone can score when given a short field. The sign of a good offense is being able to drive the length of the field. To try and compare the Nick Foles/Juron Criner-led offense with the TuiThomas era I took a look at all drives starting from between the Arizona 10-yard-line and the Arizona 40. All field goal attempts count for the offense and drives to run out the clock at the end of a half are left out.

Only the toughest out-of-conference game each year is included and all Washington State games have been removed. The 2009 numbers only include Foles’ starts and I also ignored the Holiday Bowl since I’m still not sure the team was even there.

Year	Drives	Scoring Drives	%	TD Drives	%
2007	85	23	27%	15	18%
2008	76	26	34%	18	24%
2009	71	21	30%	13	18%
2010	21	6	29%	2	10%

The 2009 offense was very similar to that of the 5-7 team of 2007. The 2010 offense thus far is producing scoring opportunities at the same rate as last year but the touchdown percentage is down.

Granted, it’s a small sample size for 2010 but with all the returning starters on offense, this unit was supposed to dominate and it hasn’t happened yet.

At least not until the end of the game. What’s interesting is the only long touchdown drives in the last two games were the two game-winners.

So what’s wrong during the other 3.75 quarters? The easy excuse is injuries. Taimi Tutogi has been out most of the year, Travis Cobb missed the Cal game and Criner hasn’t been able to explode after the catch on short routes.

The other simple solution is discipline. Cut the penalties, limit the turnovers and the good drives turn into scoring drives and the scoring drives turn into touchdowns.

The bottom line is if the above issues are going away it needs to happen this week. After four games and a bye week you need to be at full speed. If Criner and Cobb aren’t 100%, or if holding penalties are still killing drives against Oregon State it’s a really bad sign.

For good or bad, the Arizona offense you see this Saturday is probably the Arizona offense you’re going to be stuck with the rest of the year. Hopefully it’s Duck worthy.

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Say hello to Your Top-10 Arizona Wildcats.

We knew the potential was there to move up during an idle week but it was surprising to see the Cats jump all the way to #9. So it took one additional win and a well-timed bye for Arizona to claim the same ranking that Iowa brought on its trip to Tucson.

Why is the UA lagging a bit in the coaches’ poll? Well, it’s a positive indicator that we didn’t have to bring out this feature until now, but it’s time for another installment of…

Things Nobody Else Does

Mike Stoops is a voter this year in the USA Today coaches poll. He had a chance to help his team achieve the highest ranking of his career…and he didn’t turn in his ballot. You think Gabrielle Giffords and Jesse Kelly are going to have a hard time remembering to swing by the polling place on Nov. 2?

It says the USA Today couldn’t even find him. Should we be concerned? Do we put out an APB for Stoops and his hanging chad? Only at Arizona.

Speaking of the rankings, how annoyed is Oregon State right now? The Beavers bounce back to win their Pac-10 opener only to learn they’re going to be playing their third top ten team in five games, all on the road.

In other Pac-10 news, with ASU’s record dropping to 2-3 on the year coach Dennis Erickson has achieved a remarkable feat. He has managed to turn a 10-3 season (and an 8-0 start) into a .500 career record (21-21) at Arizona State.

On the flip side, if Arizona can win its next two games Mike Stoops will have turned a 6-16 start into a .500 career record (he’s currently 37-39). Like two ships passing in the night…

Now the guy just has to learn how to vote for himself.

The Arizona Wildcats baseball team wasn’t able to build on the momentum from the win at ASU as UCLA took two of three games over the weekend.

When the week began Arizona fans would have been satisfied with a 2-2 split against #1 ASU and top-10 UCLA. But after the surprising win in Tempe it looked like the Cats could take a huge step by beating the Bruins at Kindall/Sancet.

Arizona’s defense fell down against UCLA.
Photo by Pat Shannahan/The Arizona Republic

And that was true. The Wildcats could have beaten UCLA, but they didn’t.

The Bruins coasted in the second game and Arizona held on in the third game, which made Friday night’s series opener the difference. Kurt Heyer did his normal thing, allowing just one run in six innings. He left the game on the hook for his first loss, however, as the UA was having no luck scoring against UCLA ace Gerrit Cole.

You may remember Cole as the guy who turned down 4 million Yankee dollars to go to college. Was he worth the money? “He threw one pitch at 99 miles an hour,” Arizona coach Andy Lopez said. “Threw a sequence of 97, 98, 98 and 99 to (Rafael) Valenzuela.” In other words, maybe the Yankees shouldn’t have been so cheap.

But the Cats managed to scrape together a couple runs in the 7th inning thanks to three singles and a sacrifice fly. The lead held up until two outs in the 9th with freshman third baseman Seth Mejias-Brean booted a grounder to allow the tying run to score. Another error in the 10th inning led to four unearned runs to give UCLA the game and, ultimately, the series.

Saturday’s contest was lacking in dramatics as UCLA pitcher Trevor Bauer went the distance, striking out 13 and allowing just two runs. “A dominant pitching performance,” Lopez said.

(Here’s the type of thing you learn as you scan the crowd and read t-shirts and jackets while the home team is getting is shut down: Did you know the University of Arizona has a ballroom dance team?)

The BatCats do deserve credit for bouncing back with a win on Sunday. “There’s no reason to panic,” Lopez said. “We just faced two pretty good arms.”

The lone victory put the Cats back over .500 in Pac-10 play as the second-to-last road series awaits. The UCLA result does add clarity to the rest of season as it allows you to cross contending for the league title off the list, just in case you got your hopes up a little after the UA crept within two games of first-place ASU last weekend.

The NCAA tournament goal remains very much in play. The young Wildcats just need to catch it.

- – - – -

The early part of the NFL draft brought good news for the Arizona football program, while the end of the draft brought disappointment and a surprise visit from an old friend.

GRONK! went in the 2nd round which makes it very hard to argue he made a bad decision in leaving school early. If he goes on to a long career it means he was ready when he went pro. If his back goes out it means he probably would have gotten hurt here so it was good he got the bonus money when he did.

The true highlight for the UA was Earl Mitchell being selected in the 3rd round. I will always remember Big Earl running people over until the final gun in the blowout loss at LSU as a freshman fullback. We didn’t know he would turn into an NFL defensive tackle, but there was never any question about his heart and determination.

The only other Wildcat to get drafted never played a down at Arizona. Former UA basketball player Fendi Onobun is going to get a chance to show what his raw athleticism can do on the football field.

So that’s what was wrong during the end of Lute Olson’s tenure. He was recruiting NFL players instead of NBA players.

What does it mean that Arizona State got four players drafted (including UA hero Kyle Williams) while only one player from the 2009 Wildcats got selected?

If you wear maroon and gold it says Dennis Erickson is better at developing pro talent and it’s only a matter of time before the Devils are back on top.

If you prefer red and blue it means that Mike Stoops does more with less, and how is Erickson supposed to rebuild ASU when he can’t get more than four wins out of a team with four NFL players?

Maybe Erickson should start trying out some of Herb Sendek’s players.

The Arizona Wildcats have a new director of athletics and he’s already turning heads. As in, “He’s how old?”

Greg Byrne isn’t the youngest A.D. around but he’s close. There was no one younger when he was hired at Mississippi State and he’s only a year older than the current youngest buck.

Can I see some ID?

What’s age got to do with it? Not a whole lot if you can do the job but the Wildcat faithful aren’t used to this kind of inexperience. Ced Dempsey had 15 years under his A.D. belt before taking the Arizona job. Jim Livengood was an athletic director for eight years before coming to Tucson. Forgive us if we’re a little hesitant about Byrne’s 25-month tenure at Mississippi State.

To his credit it was a busy 25 months. In 2008 Byrne hired a new head football coach (Florida’s offensive coordinator) and a new head baseball coach (Kentucky’s SEC-championship-winning head coach). The hope is no major coaching hires will be needed at Arizona for a while but Wildcat fans will want to keep an interested eye on the careers of Byrne’s two guys at MSU.

The other thing that jumps out from his bio (besides the ASU thing) is the jumping. Three years with the Fiesta Bowl. Three years at Oregon. Four years at Oregon State. Three years at Kentucky. Four years at Mississippi State (in two different positions). It’s enough moving to make Dennis Erickson uncomfortable.

(Speaking of Erickson, Byrne was working for the Fiesta Bowl in January of 1994. Maybe that’s why he wants to work here.)

((If you include his undergraduate work Bryne now has direct ties to four Pac-10 schools. Perhaps he’s trying to collect the whole set.))

From his time in Corvallis you can’t help but notice Byrne was directly involved in securing the donation that led to the naming of Reser Stadium. Will there soon be a For Sale sign on Arizona Stadium?

Mr. Byrne has already brought about one change in Tucson. I set up a Twitter account. That’s right, I have now joined 2007. I was fine with all my friends and associates being cooler than me, but I draw the line at being technologically inferior to the athletics director at my alma mater. Are you ready to be amazed? Go here.

By the way, I’m glad Byrne’s official title is plain ol’ “Athletics Director” and not something like “Vice President for Intercollegiate Contests of Physical Exertion.”

In the short term Greg Byrne won’t be judged by wins and losses. He’ll be judged by dollars and cents. How soon can the football stadium expansion begin? Can McKale Center be continually renovated to keep pace nationally? How much money can he raise to keep the coaches that are (hopefully) good enough that the college sports empires will eventually come calling?

It’s enough to make a young guy grow old quick.

There’s no doubt Byrne brings energy and enthusiasm. If he can continue rising to star status we’ll be hanging on his every word.

I mean, his every tweet.

The revised power rankings are like Stanford: at the bottom.

Thu. Feb. 11
OSU (10-12 / 4-6) at ASU (16-8 / 6-5) – 6:30 p.m. (all times Arizona/Mountain)
The red-hot (for the Pac-10) Beavers have won two of their last three. To give their confidence an extra boost they beat their rival by 20.

Washington (16-7 / 6-5) at Cal (15-8 / 7-4) – 7 p.m., ESPN2
If you’ve been saving your first win away from home this would be a great time to use it.

Socks? Check. Toothbrush? Check. Win?

WSU (15-8 / 5-6) at Stanford (10-13 / 4-7) – 8 p.m.
Did the two close loses in L.A. leave the Cardinal hungry or hopeless?

Oregon (12-10 / 4-6) at ARIZONA (12-11 / 6-5) – 8:30 p.m., FSN
Must-win starts now for the Wildcats.

Sat. Feb. 13
WSU at Cal – 2 p.m., FSN
Come on, DeAngelo Casto, we need you to beat up on someone besides Arizona.

Oregon at ASU – 4 p.m., FSAZ
Can the Devils avoid looking ahead to the Kevin Parrom Revenge Game?

OSU at ARIZONA – 6 p.m., KWBA/FCS
In a year when the Cats already have hit double-digits in losses, getting beat by the Beavers remains the worst of them.

Washington at Stanford – 6 p.m., FSNW
If the Huskies can’t win this one they should just turn in their frequent flier cards.

Sun. Feb. 14
UCLA (11-12 / 6-5) at USC (14-9 / 6-5) – 8 p.m., FSN
“Happy Valentine’s Day! I made dinner reservations. You like nachos, right?”

Another week, another jumble in the middle. Fear you not, the TWIT-Pac power rankings are here to sort things out. Last week’s ranking (looks like this).

The Leader
1. Cal (2) – One win in L.A. was enough.

The 6-5s
2. USC (8) – 5-1 vs. the top half, 1-4 vs. the bottom half.
3. ARIZONA (1) – Also does better against the better teams.
4. UCLA (3) – The best sub-.500 team in America.
5. Washington (6) – Prove it this week, U-Dub. PROVE IT!
6. ASU (4) – An Ericksonian 1-5 against the upper division.

"Hello? Portland State?"
Photo by Rob Schumacher, The Arizona Republic

The Coogz
7. WSU (7) – Stuck at unlucky #7.

The Civil Warriors
8. OSU (10) – Half their four wins are against Oregon.
9. Oregon (5) – The Ducks went from on-fire to probably-getting-fired.

The Cellar
10. Stanford (9) – Good news, Cardinal fans! Home games are coming!

Logic says Cal, Arizona, and ASU will win at home to create a little separation from the pack. But we all know logic has nothing to do with the Pac-10 this year. Who is going to serve their fans a steaming pile of disgust?

Some clichés are more fun than others. There’s also a cliché about winning ugly that applies.

Nobody was able to make us feel better after the Washington and Cal games. And that same nobody can make us feel bad about beating ASU.

Sometimes the ball bounces off someone’s foot. Sometimes a tipped ball lands in a confused quarterback’s hands. But sometimes a blocked punt isn’t returnable and the team ends up settling for a field goal. Sometimes a muffed punt hops right back into the returner’s hands. The latter two didn’t happen on this particular day and the Wildcats left Sun Devil Stadium victorious.

Each football season is divided into three parts with the opportunity to earn a fourth. There’s the out-of-conference season, the Pac-10 season, and your rivalry game. The Cats did well enough in the first season, the second season is incomplete, but the 2009 version of the third season is officially and forever a success.

On a day when the UA offense never got it going as Nick Foles had to wear a Luke Skywalker-like glove to protect his injured hand, the Wildcat D-line came up huge with a combined five sacks. Not bad for a bunch of converted fullbacks.

Have you noticed all four of our starting defensive lineman have a uniform number in the 40s? Oh, you didn’t? You must have only been looking for useful information.

ASU’s defense is legit but unfortunately for them the Devil offense is really, really, really, really, really, really bad. How strange is it to see Arizona with the superior quarterback and ASU with the defense that is dying for some support?

How terrifying was it that we were staring at overtime with a minute to play? None of us in Red and Blue needed extra football for the second straight week. Overtime should be banned for a while. Blame the economy if you have to. I’ll gladly take a furlough.

If you want to drive yourself crazy consider this: If Foles’ pass at Cal doesn’t get tipped, and if the Cats get the stop on 4th-and-4 against Oregon, this win against ASU clinches the Rose Bowl. Two plays.

But I will be staying sane this week. My glass is half-full and it’s conspicuously shaped like a silver cup from 1899. Bring on the good news…

We won a three-point game! The seven close-game losing streak is over.

We won wearing white-on-white! It was the first win for our palest uniform combination since Willie Tuitama’s first start four years ago. That win was by two points so the flip side is two of Mike Stoops’ three 3-points-or-less wins have been in white-on-white, meaning both of the white-on-white wins in the Stoops era (we’re 2-6) were decided by narrow margins.

Fashion conclusion: Arizona can win while wearing white jerseys and white pants, but rarely, and barely.

Stoops is now 3-3 against ASU but he’s 2-1 against Dennis Erickson. Considering Devil fans’ low opinion of Coach Mike that has to annoy them the way it bothers Wildcats that Stoops finished with a losing record against Dirk Koetter.

Sun Devils should be happy they don’t have a bowl game. Erickson (now 19-18 at ASU) gets to call himself a winning coach for a few more months.

Don’t forget that Koetter was fired for winning 54% of his games, after Bruce Snyder was fired for winning 57% of his games.

Mike Stoops on the other hand had his best season to date last year and he has a chance to better it this year. With seven wins the Cats have now guaranteed a bowl game and winning record for the second straight year.

My prediction is a win against USC puts us in the Sun Bowl while a loss leaves us with the Poinsettia Bowl.

Well, the Poinsettia isn’t a prediction, it’s a fact. But if the UA beats USC and Oregon beats OSU I think the Holiday Bowl takes Stanford and their Heisman Trophy finalist leaving the Cats for El Paso.

The only other potential scenario I see after a win over USC is this:

1. OSU beats Oregon to go to the Rose Bowl.
2. The Holiday Bowl has to take Oregon.
3. The Sun Bowl takes Toby Heisman.
4. The Emerald ignores the pleas from Vegas and settles for a repeat visit from hometown Cal.
5. The Bowl Formerly Known As Las Vegas has to take Arizona who is ahead of USC in the standings.

The Vegas opponent? BYU, as the Cougars finished second in the MWC with TCU going to a BCS bowl. Could you handle an exact repeat of last year’s bowl matchup?

That wouldn’t be a bad bounce at all.

Thanksgiving? True, but that’s not what I had in mind.

The week after we got our hopes up for the Rose Bowl only to have them ripped away reopening a decades-old wound? Now you’re just being cruel. Let me give you a hint:

ASU! (wonk-WONK-wonk) ASU! (wonk-WONK-wonk) ASU! (WONK-wonk-WONK)

Now do you feel it?

Rivalry week is here.

They say you can throw the records out the window in games like this and that’s good news for both teams. Arizona has tumbled in the league standings with two consecutive losses and ASU is staggering to the finish on a five-game slide. Very few eyes outside the Grand Canyon State will be tuning in to this one which would appear to give this year’s game little significance. But don’t tell that to any of the guys lining up in the trenches on Saturday, or any of the fans, families and alumni squaring off across the aisle or in the living room.

No hype, no national implications, just two neighboring schools doing battle for football bragging rights.

Ain’t it beautiful?

A year’s worth of pride is more than enough incentive but there’s plenty more on the line. The Cats are trying to win consecutive games in the series for the first time since – of course – 1997 and ’98. That was the final year of that glorious run when the UA went 13-3-1. Since then the Devils have fought back with a 7-3 run of their own. As the Zeros come to a close the Devils have already clinched a winning decade in the rivalry, their first since the ‘70s.

Arizona has locked up a better Pac-10 record than ASU this year which means the UA will finish ahead of ASU in the league standings for the second straight year. This is the first such streak for the Cats since three consecutive superior Pac finishes in 1992-’94.

The Wildcats are trying to use this game as a stepping stone to the Holiday Bowl. If we win out and Oregon beats OSU we finish no worse than a four-way tie for second. (The sixth place team in that scenario? Holy cow…USC.) Even if the Holiday passed on Arizona you have to think the Sun Bowl would snatch up the Cats in a second, so we can still have a very solid year – as long as we beat Arizona State.

That’s easier said than done. The UA hasn’t won at Sun Devil Stadium since we had hope for Mackovic (his first year, 2001).

You want some happier facts? Here are a few trivia questions you may want to use around the office or Thanksgiving dinner table:

Who has the most recent top-10 finish?
Arizona, 1998 to 1996

Who has the most recent current-BCS bowl win?
Arizona, 1993 to 1986

Who has the most recent bowl win?
Arizona, 2008 to 2005

Who has the most winning in-conference seasons in the Pac-10?
Arizona, 14 to 12, not counting this year

Who has the most head-to-head wins in Pac-10 era?
Arizona, 17 to 13

Who has the most head-to-head wins overall?
Arizona, 45 to 36

As far as that last one, don’t let anyone give you the “Look at the head-to-head since Arizona State College became a university” excuse. There’s a reason they call it “all time.” Look here, Normals/Owls/Bulldogs/Sun Devils. Just because you legally change your name doesn’t mean you’re not still the guy who got hung by his underwear in gym class.

The stats say if the Arizona offense plays well this weekend the Cats win. ASU hasn’t scored more than 21 points during their losing streak. They haven’t put up 28 against anyone in the Pac-10 and they’ve ended up in the teens (or worse) five times. This is not a good offensive team.

But they can play some D. Number one in the Pac-10 in total defense and pass defense, and #2 in rushing defense and scoring defense. Oh, and #1 in penalties.

The Devil D is talented and reckless and that’s what makes them dangerous. If this game were a cop movie the ASU defense would be the loose cannon that’s going to get someone killed. We just have to make sure it’s not our quarterback.

The Arizona O-line needs to take it personally. No one touches Nick Foles. Maintain your blocks until two seconds after the pass. We don’t need a repeat of 2005 and ’06 when Willie Tuitama left the game and a win left the building.

Speaking of leaving, here’s something for ASU fans to ponder: Dennis Erickson has coached at three Pac-10 schools. He has a nine-win season at each school. He has exactly one nine-win season at each school.

Here’s something for Wildcat fans to ponder: Our last two road games were Washington and Cal. You have every right to be terrified.

One thing I know for certain is Arizona better build (and maintain) a lead bigger than three points if we want to win. After dropping yet another close one last week the Versus stat is starting to take on a life of its own. The Cats are 0-2 this year in games decided by three points or less which makes it seven straight losses and 2-11 all-time for Mike Stoops. This is a bad thing.

The Wildcats need to score touchdowns early and often to take the hope from the Sun Devils and suck the life from the home crowd. A quiet Sun Devil Stadium means no upset, no ending the season on a high note…

And no WONK-wonk-WONK.