Holiday Bowl notes: Anybody up for some trick plays?
by Anthony Gimino on Dec. 29, 2009, under Sports
UA offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes says you don't want to overdo trick plays in a bowl game/Tucson Citizen photo
SAN DIEGO — Greetings from beautiful San Diego as the Arizona Wildcats are ready to play Nebraska on Wednesday night in the Holiday Bowl. …
No secret here. As UA defensive end Brooks Reed says, this game is “defense against defense.” The oddsmakers in Las Vegas agree, as the Holiday Bowl had the lowest over/under total of the 34 postseason games, with the points-scored number hovering around 40.
Sounds like a good time for both teams to break out some trick plays.
Neither team can be confident in its ability to put together something like a 10-play, 80-yard drive. I see this as more of a heavyweight rope-a-dope fight, with each offense just waiting for that one opening to land a haymaker.
With the extra time to prepare, a bowl game is a good time for trick plays, anyway.
“It is,” UA offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes said after a recent practice.
“You have a little bit more time to get prepared and watch tape and all that stuff. The big thing is sometimes you get too creative and do too much new stuff. And, really, the bowl game is all about getting our guys to play fast and execute. There is always a balancing act between enough new stuff and being able to execute the stuff you do.”
Arizona backup quarterback Matt Scott can really be a wildcard here. He is healthy again after missing the USC game with a rib injury. UA hasn’t really explored its full options of having two quarterbacks on the field at the same time, but this might be the time to throw caution to the wind and keep the superb Cornhuskers defense off balance with Scott’s running threat. …
Quarterback Nick Foles’ quick release will help him against a ferocious Nebraska pass rush, led by defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh. But Nebraska’s sack total (42) is also a factor of an excellent secondary, which can create coverage sacks. Can the defensive backs take away UA’s screen game and make Foles hold the ball a bit longer?
Sounds like the key question for Arizona. …
Dykes on Suh, who was the Associated Press Player of the Year: “The thing about him is he is just so productive. You look up and he has nine or 10 tackles, and it seemed liked he had three or four. He really has a great feel for the game. When he’s rushing and he can’t get there, he knocks balls down. He plays screens. He really is a smart football player.’ …
Arizona not only had a wonderful talent base when it played Nebraska in the 1998 Holiday Bowl — cornerback Chris McAlister, offensive lineman Edwin Mulitalo and receiver Dennis Northcutt, to name three long-standing NFL players — but it had an all-star cast of coaches.
Consider: That nine-man staff had four coaches who either were, have been or are head coaches … and that doesn’t even include Duane Akina, who just might be the best secondary coach in the business.
Bob Wagner, the former head coach at Hawaii, was the inside linebackers coach. Jeff Woodruff, who would go on to be the head coach at Eastern Michigan, coached the running backs. Defensive coordinator Rich Ellerson just completed his first season as head coach at Army after a successful run as the head coach at Cal Poly. And Rob Ianello, who was Arizona’s recruiting coordinator and receivers coach, was just hired as the head coach at Akron.
Others on the staff included four respected assistants who have stayed busy in the business, including offensive coordinator Dino Babers (now at Baylor), offensive line coach Charlie Dickey (Kansas State) and Marty Long (Northwestern). Pete Alamar, who had been at Cal since 2003 (special teams/tight ends) was let go this week. Thoughts go out to Long, who recently underwent emergency surgery for what published reports called a “growth.” Long, 45, will miss Northwestern’s appearance in the Outback Bowl. …
As for Ianello, former UA head coach Dick Tomey, interviewed by TucsonCitizen.com’s Matt Minkus on a recent podcast at radioexiles.com, said that “Akron has hired someone who will put them on the map.” Tomey added: “Rob is just so smart, so hard-working, and he will be as good a recruiter as any head coach in the country.” …
Outgoing Arizona athletic director Jim Livengood was at a Holiday Bowl luncheon on Tuesday, as he hasn’t completely left the premises for his new job at UNLV. His first major act as the athletic director at UNLV was to hire Montana football coach Bobby Hauck, who was 80-17 in seven seasons with the Grizzlies, a powerhouse program in the Football Championship Subdivision.
Hauck is 45; it was only a matter of time before someone gave him a top-division job. Livengood will be trying to buck history with this hiring, though. UNLV is a graveyard of coaches. Of the nine head coaches in the Rebels’ history, only one ever coached in college again after his days in Las Vegas. That would be Ron Meyer, who jumped to SMU in 1976 and then the NFL in 1982.
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