Matt Scott’s 461 yards of total offense vs. Toledo was the third-highest total in Arizona history. Photo by Matt Kartozian-US PRESSWIRE

Arizona Wildcats quarterback Matt Scott accounted for 461 total yards last week, the second-best mark in the country, but is fretting about all the yardage that got away.

“I don’t think that was a very good game for me,” he said after Tuesday’s practice.

“I know I can do better, and I intend to a lot better. Missed a couple of easy passes I wish I could have had back. I probably let my mechanics down a couple of time, lost my focus a little bit.”

While missing a few wide-open receivers down field, Scott did hit on 30 of 46 throws for 387 yards, with two touchdowns and one interception against Toledo. He ran 14 times for 74 yards.

Only Syracuse quarterback Ryan Nassib (500 yards) ranks ahead of Scott in total yardage after the first week of college football.

Arizona coaches aren’t complaining much about Scott’s performance.

“For the most part, he did a very good job of deciphering, analyzing, deciding where to go with the football,” said quarterbacks coach and co-offensive coordinator Rod Smith.

“He did a fairly good for his first game in this system. His eyes were right, I’d say, at least 90 percent of the time. When you do that, then it’s just a matter of executing.

“Now, I don’t think they (Toledo) give you a lot of complicated, different looks, so that helped. We’ll get more complex looks this week. He will be tested a lot more.”

Arizona plays 18th-ranked Oklahoma State at Arizona Stadium on Saturday (7:30 p.m., Pac-12 Network). The Cowboys led the nation last season in takeaways with 44. That was five more than second-place North Carolina State and 10 more than third-place Rutgers.

In other words, that was a stunningly high total posted by Oklahoma State.

“No. 1, they do a good a job of giving you different looks,” Smith said. “And they do a good job of pressuring you and they are relentless to the ball.

“They play hard and you can see them trying to strip the ball. They’re not sitting back, waiting for things to happen. They are making things happen. You have to give them credit for that.”

Mimicking Matt
Quarterback Daxx Garman lasted only one semester at Arizona, transferring last winter after UA hired Rodriguez, who brought with him his read-option offense that didn’t fit Garman’s skills.

Garman landed at Oklahoma State and is sitting out this season under NCAA transfer rules. He is running the Cowboys’ scout team this week in advance of Saturday’s game against the Wildcats.

Can Garman do a good football impersonation of Scott?

Scott smiled.

“I don’t want to hate on him and everything, but we’ll see how that goes,” Scott said. “He’s a pretty good athlete, so we’ll see what happens.”

Oklahoma State linebackers coach Glenn Spencer, the acting defensive coordinator while Bill Young is out because of undisclosed medical reasons, told the Daily Oklahoman he’s talked with Garman about Arizona’s personnel.

“He can talk about their athleticism and their personalities a little bit,” Spencer told the newspaper. “Schematically, it’s so much different, so you really can’t go in there and talk scheme with him.

“But, yeah, I’ve bounced some things off him. And he’s shared some insight on some players and what he thought about them athletically and their personalities and if they’re tough guys or not, so that was pretty interesting.”

Depth chart doings
Mostly minor tweaks to the official depth chart this week. They include:

– Jonathan McKnight is ahead of Derrick Rainey at the cornerback spot opposite Shaquille Richardson.

– Redshirt freshman walk-on Sir Thomas Jackson is No. 1 at weak-side linebacker, moving ahead of Hank Hobson, who was out last week because of a shoulder injury (Arizona will provide injury updates on Thursday.)

– Reggie Gilbert and Willie Mobley are listed as co-starters at defensive tackle along the three-man front. Gilbert started last week.

– True freshman William Parks made the two-deep as a backup to Bandit safety Jared Tevis.

He said it
“Outside, I guess, of the birth of your children — that’s OK; that’s not exciting to watch or anything — there’s nothing better than a winning locker room. Nothing even comes close to it.” — Rich Rodriguez

Keep in touch
Not sure if former Arizona coach Mike Stoops lost Scott’s number or what, but he did text message an athletic department employee on Saturday morning, asking to pass along his well-wishes to the quarterback before the game. (They were, indeed, passed along.) Scott said he also received a message of encouragement from former quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo.

Tom Savage won nine games as a true freshman starter at Rutgers in 2009. Photo by Charles LeClaire-USPRESSWIRE

Arizona Wildcats freshman quarterback Daxx Garman will transfer, new coach Rich Rodriguez told TucsonCitizen.com on Monday.

And then later in the afternoon, quarterback Tom Savage, from Springfield, Pa., told Rodriguez he was transferring back to a school on the East Coast because of a family issue.

Rodriguez talked positively about Savage to TucsonCitizen.com and other media outlets today as he went through a press junket with local media. After that, Savage informed Rodriguez of his decision.

In a press release, Savage said: “This is a personal decision about my family and was not influenced by Coach Rodriguez or his style of play.”

Rodriguez said: “Tom has indicated to us that he wants to transfer closer to home for family reasons. He said it has nothing to do with football, schemes, or the University of Arizona. We certainly wish him and his family the best in the future.”

Garman redshirted this season behind Nick Foles, Bryson Beirne and senior Matt Scott, who also redshirted. Garman, who was ruled ineligible for his senior year at Southlake (Texas) Carroll High School after transferring from a school in Oklahoma, arrived at Arizona this spring.

Rodriguez said he wasn’t sure to which school Garman would transfer.

While Scott’s athleticism and background in the zone-read offense make him a good fit for Rodriguez’s system, the coach had said that Savage — whose background is as a pocket passer — could run his offense, too.

Savage, sat out this season after his transfer from Rutgers and has two years of eligibility left, had indicated to Rodriguez he would stay, prior to the family issue. Savage was a Freshman All-American in 2009 with the Scarlet Knights, passing for 2,211 yards before being injured and losing his starting job as a sophomore.

“I remember watching him (at Rutgers),” Rodriguez said, adding that it was “going to be a good competition between him and Matt.”

Early in the day Rodriguez was pleased at the quarterback experience he had inherited.

“This is a good base for me to come into. There’s certainly a lot more experience than when I went to Michigan,” he said. “I had no quarterbacks. I started with a quarterback who was a walk-on. I didn’t have a quarterback who had taken a snap.

Now, he has one at Arizona. Scott is the only scholarship quarterback on the roster.

Arizona has two committed quarterbacks in its recruiting class — Josh Kern from San Antonio and Nate Sudfeld from Modesto, Calif.

Rodriguez will honor their scholarship offers from the previous coaching staff, if those quarterbacks decide they still want to come to Arizona to play in a different offense.

A possible option for Arizona includes receiver Richard Morrison, who arrived at Arizona as a dual-threat quarterback. Freshman receiver David Richards also played some quarterback in high school.

Rodriguez said no other players have indicated they will transfer.

“Sometimes you worry about that in a transition,” Rodriguez said.

“I told the guys they have to give us a shot, give us a chance to show you the process. The sooner they embrace it, the sooner they will have success.”

It's not always easy to stay relaxed in the pocket when defenders are crashing the party. Photo by Steve Dykes/Getty Images

Nick Foles, as a fifth-year senior quarterback, knows the best piece of advice he can give true freshman quarterback Daxx Garman is to relax. Be patient.

“I just told him that everything is going to be going really fast right now,” Foles said after Tuesday morning’s practice.

“He’s a good player. He has really come along a lot. Every day you can see it. Especially when he gets to slow it down in 7-on-7. You can see him go through his reads, and he can deliver the ball.”

But the game isn’t played in 7-on-7 drills, and everything changes when the defensive line is charging with evil intent and the quarterback is trying to look over and around huge offensive linemen.

Foles said Garman has to avoid looking at the rush — feel it, don’t look at it.

“When you glance, then you don’t see the routes downfield, so then you’re just looking to scramble. You’re going to get out of it sometimes, but a lot of times you’re going to get stuck,” Foles said.

“It’s better to just work the pocket, stay in there just a split second longer, and something is going to open up down field. He just needs to work the pocket a little better and he’ll be fine. Right now, everything is moving kind of fast for him.”

Foles, a veteran of 21 starts at Arizona, said he went through the same kind of stuff when he was a freshman at Michigan State.

And, now, he might as well be back in the pocket in a rocking chair, sipping ice tea.

“Once the speed slows down for you, it’s relaxing being out there,” he said. “Going through your reads, it’s relaxing to me — just seeing it, knowing it, dropping back, feeling the pocket and delivering the ball.”

Garman has been taking second-string reps in the past two practices because of the knee injury to Bryson Beirne, and the absence of Matt Scott (strep throat, according to coach Mike Stoops).

Related: Garman has to be more ready than ever

Lineup watch

Senior receiver Gino Crump has had previous good camps — call him Mr. August, or Mr. April — but he hasn’t been able to crack the rotation during the season. He had four catches last season.

But, once again, he’s impossible to ignore in camp. He hauled in two more long touchdown catches — 50 yards each from Foles — in Tuesday’s practice.

Wide receivers coach Dave Nichol said last season that the thing that holding Crump back was consistency, and that he needed a high number of reps to stay on top of his game. And it was hard to get that high number of reps during the season when he was behind so many others on the depth chart.

Through camp, Crump (6-2, 210) has been consistently good.

“He’s always kind of flashed at times, but now he’s being a lot more consistent,” Nichols told Steve Rivera of FoxSportsArizona.com and TucsonCitizen.com. “Sometimes when people are watching all they see are the good plays but they don’t see guys busting a route or miss a block.”

Said Crump: “I put in time working on my extra effort and that consistency. All the coaches have ever asked me is to be more consistent. I’m trying that. I’m trying to be the player I know I’ve always wanted to be.”

He said it

“Every since I have gotten here, we have been like best friends. We room together every game. We room together in camp, and he’s one of those guys I’m really close to. … It’s tough to see him go through this, but I’m going to be there to support him, like he’s always supported me. He’s always been right there behind me in games. If something goes wrong, he comes up to me and says something. He keeps me straight and I keep him straight.” — Foles, on Beirne, who suffered what is being called a sprained knee Saturday.

Noteworthy

Stoops — who cut short his post-practice interview on Monday night, saying he was weary about answering questions about injured players — was given the day off from the local media Tuesday morning. … Stoops, however, was mic’d up during practice for ESPN, which was in town to gather video and sound for a Tom Rinaldi piece on the Stoops brothers. The feature is slated for College Football GameDay at some point. … Arizona is scheduled to be back at two-a-days on Wednesday.

Daxx Garman delivers a pass in the spring. Photo by Michael Chow/The Arizona Republic

Bryson Beirne’s sprained right knee and indefinite absence moves the spotlight closer to true freshman quarterback Daxx Garman.

With Beirne out, Garman is one of three scholarship quarterbacks who are eligible this season for the Arizona Wildcats. The others are starter Nick Foles and Matt Scott — and Scott wants to redshirt this season.

If it’s a long-term emergency, the coaches will have to play Scott, of course, but Garman could be needed to take some snaps in a short-term situation.

Who is this kid?

His most recent address before arriving at Arizona in the spring was Southlake, Texas, although he was ruled ineligible to play last season at powerhouse Carroll High school after his family moved from Jones, Okla. You can read some details about that from the Dallas Morning News.

Garman graduated early and had the benefit of spring practice at Arizona, then spent the summer trying to add strength to his 6-foot-2, 175-pound frame. The difference is dramatic when he stands next to Foles — who has about 65 pounds and three inches of height on him.

“It was a great opportunity to get to know the old guys better, to get more advanced as far as the playbook goes, reading defenses,” Garman said of being here in the spring.

Arizona strength coach Corey Edmond, especially in the summer, made sure Garman made physical strides, working on the young quarterback’s legs and core muscles.

“I can tell a big difference in my arm strength,” Garman said. “I have a lot more on the ball, and I’m using my legs more. It takes a lot of stress of my arm as far as that goes.”

Arizona fans likely can take an extended look at Garman at Saturday’s Meet the Team night at Arizona Stadium. The gates open at 5 p.m., and the scrimmage will start at 6 p.m. The Wildcats will sign autographs afterward.

Garman was rated a three-star recruit by Rivals.com, but it’s hard to say how that rating would have been affected had he played as a senior.

Quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo said Garman’s presence in the spring removed the freshman jitters and has allowed Garman to find a comfort zone in fall camp.

“He went through spring and, c’mon, he should have been going to the senior prom,” Scelfo said.

“But he was out here battling away, and that’s a tough deal. Now, he knows where he’s at. He knows his place. He feels comfortable.”

And Scelfo wasn’t just talking about on the football field.

“He knows how to get around campus; he knows how to get around town. All the guesswork and the anxiety are gone. He can focus in more on football rather than where he parked his car and if he is going to get a ticket.”

For Garman, now, it’s full speed ahead.

Related: Arizona football notes: Beirne out with sprained knee

Scelfo

Note: This wraps up our conversation last week with Arizona quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo. See links at bottom of post for more on the Wildcats quarterbacks.

Arizona’s 2012 quarterback plans are up in the air.

The Wildcats could have senior Matt Scott — if all goes well and he is able to redshirt behind Nick Foles this season.

And the Wildcats could have Rutgers transfer quarterback Tom Savage, who, as of Wednesday, is on a recruiting visit to Arizona.

Or they could have neither.

In the meantime, true freshman quarterback Daxx Garman, who enrolled at the semester break, can prepare for the future without the urgency of getting ready to play right away.

How can Arizona help him before spring practice begins?

“Just getting him to class, find the locker room, getting dressed, try to get him to take a deep breath so he’s OK with stuff,” quarterback coach Frank Scelfo said light-heartedly.

“The good part about a guy coming in early is that you’re able to coach him and spend time with him without the rigors of getting ready for a game. Because once you get to the season, you can’t spend time with those guys.”

That was the case in the fall with freshman Cam Allerheiligen, who spent last season on the scout team. He’s the team’s other young scholarship quarterback who will get coaching attention in spring ball, which starts March 21. The spring game is set for April 16.

“Cam is a really smart guy. He’s a gym rat,” Scelfo said. “He’s more than capable and he’s starting to come into his own. He’s starting to feel more comfortable.”

A year from now, each of these quarterbacks might be competing for playing time — or even a starting spot, who knows? — but Scelfo can continue to work on their fundamentals until then.

Garman didn’t play high school ball last season, ruled ineligible after transferring from Jones (Okla.) High to Southlake (Texas) Carroll High School. Arizona coach Mike Stoops said having Garman here for spring helps make up for that experience gap.

Perhaps in a hurry.

“It’s going to be one of those things where he gets a good feel for what’s going on, and we’ll evaluate him and see how rusty he is and then let him go play,” Scelfo said.

“We’re going to be yelling at him in the spring game and he should be going to prom.”

More Arizona quarterback stories:

Ex-Rutgers quarterback Tom Savage makes Arizona his first recruiting stop

Scelfo sets out spring strategy for Nick Foles

Even with redshirt plan, Matt Scott needs to prepare to play