Nick Foles (left) is completing 75 percent of his passes, but third-stringer Byrson Beirne hasn't missed at all. Photo by Mark Evans, TucsonCitizen.com

The Arizona Wildcats are completing 74.13 percent of their passes this season. That’s not just good for a program that has been historically starved at quarterback. It’s good for anybody, anywhere, anytime.

In fact, if Nick Foles and Matt Scott — and maybe even third-stringer Bryson Beirne and anyone else throwing a pass off a trick play — can push that percentage a little higher, it would challenge an NCAA record.

That belongs to the 2008 Colt McCoy-led Texas team that completed 76.7 percent of its passes (343 of 447). Arizona’s current percentage would be the second-best figure ever.

Can we get an assistant coach of the year award for first-year quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo?

“I think Frank Scelfo has done a great job coaching these two guys,” Arizona head coach Mike Stoops said, referring to Foles and Scott. “Anytime you can complete over 75 percent of your throws … that’s not an accident.”

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Luke Walton has fond memories of the late Maurice Lucas. Photo by Christopher Hanewinckel-US PRESSWIRE

Former Arizona Wildcat forward Luke Walton spoke with ESPN Los Angeles about his namesake, former NBA player Maurice Lucas, who died at the age of 58 because of bladder cancer.

Lucas was a great friend and Portland Trail Blazers teammate of Bill Walton.

(Unlike many men of Luke Walton’s age, he was not named after Luke Skywalker of the Star Wars saga. His first name is in honor of Lucas.)

Luke was asked how his dad described Lucas to him:

“He always told us the greatest two teammates he ever had were Larry Bird and Maurice Lucas. He had nothing but great things to say about him, on and off the court. His character. The person he was. It’s obviously tough, knowing my dad just lost one of his best friends. He always spoke very highly of him and every time we saw him, he was always great to us. A lot of fun to talk to. To hang out with. A big, loving, caring type of man.”

Read more of the Q&A at ESPN.com.

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QB Nick Foles is showing complete command of the UA offense/Photo by Rick Osentoski-US PRESSWIRE

NOTE: This part of the weekly “Nothin’ But The Notes” column at WildcatSportsReport.com, written by me and Javier Morales. Follow the link for more football and loads of basketball recruiting.

One of the many encouraging things about Arizona’s opening game against the Toledo was the absolute control, the calmness, that quarterback Nick Foles showed.

Even when the offense sputtered in the first half, there was absolutely no panic, and first-year quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo said that comes from Foles being a dedicated student of he game in the offseason.

“The thing with Nick is that he’s knowledgeable,” Scelfo said. “He knew what he was doing. He felt comfortable with the game plan. It’s like taking a test and knowing the answers. He had a great offseason.”

One thing Scelfo and head coach Mike Stoops mentioned as an area of improvement is getting to the line and getting the ball snapped fast.

“We have a chance to put the defense at a little bit of a disadvantage is we can pick up the tempo a little bit more,” Scelfo said.

Trivia question
Did you know that there are seven former Arizona football assistants who are now head coaches at some level of college football? Probably not. Question is, how many can you name? Answer below.

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DeWayne Peace moved to cornerback in the spring.

The Arizona Wildcats football team is losing redshirt freshman cornerback DeWayne Peace, who will transfer closer to home, according to WildcatSportsReport.com, a partner in the TucsonCitizen.com Sports Network.

Peace, from Grand Prairie, Texas, will transfer to Blinn College, a junior college in Brenham, Texas.

Peace, who showed good athleticism and speed in scrimmage situations, was a scout team receiver last fall but was moved to defense in the spring. He was not on the two-deep depth chart released by the school after spring ball.

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Scelfo

In a story first reported by our sports network partner Wildcat Sports Report, Arizona head coach Mike Stoops will announce the hiring of Frank Scelfo as his quarterbacks coach in an ironic spin of the coaching carousel.

Scelfo had been the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Louisiana Tech, elevated to interim head coach two weeks ago when Derek Dooley left to become the head coach at Tennessee.

Louisiana Tech then hired Arizona offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes to lead the Bulldogs.

A good trade? Let’s see how it all shakes out at Arizona.

Although it was first reported that Scelfo would be a co-coordinator, those titles will fall to well-respected offensive line coach Bill Bedenbaugh and running backs/tight ends coach Seth Littrell, both of whom have backgrounds in the Texas Tech-style spread offense.

Scelfo is an experienced assistant and has a good reputation as a play-caller who understands the passing game.

Prior to his three-year stint with Louisiana Tech, he spent 11 years on the staff at Tulane, including the final eight as offensive coordinator.

While there, he tutored four future NFL quarterbacks — Patrick Ramsey, J.P. Losman, Lester Ricard, and Shaun King – which is four more quarterbacks than Arizona has sent to the NFL in its entire Pac-10 existence.

Stoops said Wednesday he had interviewed three candidates for the position. Scelfo attended a UA fan recruiting event in the Phoenix area on Thursday.

Stoops has had two previous offensive coordinators. The first one, Mike Canales, was recently hired as coordinator at North Texas after he wasn’t retained by new South Florida head coach Skip Holtz.

From his Louisiana Tech bio about his days with Tulane:

Scelfo directed one of the most innovative offenses in the college game as the Green Wave finished ranked in the top 30 nationally in passing offense five times, including ranking 3rd in passing offense (324.45) in 2000, 5th in passing offense (327.3) in 1999 and 12th in passing offense (291.50) in 2001.

Sonny Dykes at his introductory news conference in Ruston, La./Photo by Arely D. Castillo, The (Monroe) News-Star

Arizona offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes was announced as Louisiana Tech’s head coach late Wednesday afternoon, leaving the Wildcats without a key coach two weeks before signing day.

At his introductory press conference, Dykes said that as of yesterday, he still “fully expected” to be at Arizona. “That’s the way this business goes sometimes,” he said about a fast-moving coaching search.

Dykes thanked Arizona coach Mike Stoops and the Wildcat players, although he did incorrectly refer to his former school as “Arizona University.”

“Without them,” he said of the Arizona coaches and players, “I wouldn’t have this great opportunity to represent Louisiana Tech.”

Dykes replaces Derek Dooley, who resigned late last week to become the coach at Tennessee, which had to replace Lane Kiffin, who left for USC when Pete Carroll bolted for the Seattle Seahawks.

RELATED:
What’s coach Mike Stoops’ next move on offense?

UA fans, welcome to big boy football

It was an unkind late spin of the coaching carousel for the Wildcats, who already have replaced defensive coordinator Mark Stoops with Greg Brown, hired from Colorado to coach the secondary and be co-coordinator with returning linebackers coach Tim Kish.

Dykes, 40, spent the past three years at Arizona, importing a lite version of the pass-happy spread offense he learned under Mike Leach at Texas Tech.

Arizona set team records for most pass attempts in his first season, averaging 44.3 per game in 2007, before settling on a more balanced approach. Dykes has been considered head coaching timber for the past couple of seasons, but Wednesday’s news — especially coming so late in the “coaching change” season — mostly came out of the blue.

“This has been a crazy 48 hours and 24 hours and six hours,” Dykes said. “It’s been a whirlwind.”

He added later: “It’s something I have worked my entire life to get to this point, and I have had a lot of great mentors.”

He further added: “There are not two more different people in the world than Mike Stoops and Mike Leach. They’re polar opposites. When you have an opportunity to work with those kind of guys, you can’t help but learn something.”

Dykes inherits a team that was 8-5 last season, including a 17-10 win over Northern Illinois in the Independence Bowl.

He called it the “right program at the right time” and said that he asked his dad, legendary former Texas Tech coach Spike Dykes, for advice. “The advice he gave me is that there is no reason to look at any job if you don’t think you can win there,” Sonny said.

Added acting athletic director Bruce Van De Velde said Dykes was on his list as a potential head coaching replacement, which was reinforced by the school’s executive search committee. Van De Velde said Dykes absolutely nailed the interview for the job.

“What a big day for Louisiana Tech, huh?” Van De Velde said.

Yep. Not so much for Arizona, though.

Sonny Dykes/Tucson Citizen photo

Now that Arizona offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes is going to be the head coach at Louisiana Tech, UA head coach Mike Stoops, entering his seventh season, will be looking for his third offensive coordinator.

Previously, he replaced Mike Canales after the 2006 season with Dykes. (Hey, Canales is available, having been cut loose after the head coaching change at South Florida.)

Most of the assistants on Arizona’s offensive coaching staff have experience at Texas Tech and with the basis of UA’s spread offense. But no one among the group of line coach Bill Bedenbaugh, inside receivers coach Garret Chachere, running backs coach Seth Littrell and outside receivers coach Dave Nichol has experience calling plays at this level.

Bedenbaugh carries the additional title of running game coordinator.

Too bad Stoops’ pal from his Oklahoma days, Chuck Long, was hired by new Kansas coach Turner Gill last month. Long was out of coaching last season after being fired as head coach of San Diego State. Long and Darrell Wyatt, an assistant at Arizona in 2007, will be co-coordinators with the Jayhawks. Could either be pried loose?

What about this as a possibility: Josh Heupel. He, too, has no experience in play-calling, but Oklahoma’s quarterbacks coach, who will be 32 in March, is considered a rising star in the profession.

Heupel spent the 2005 season at Arizona as the tight ends coach before jumping back to Oklahoma, where he has coached quarterbacks (including 2008 Heisman winner Sam Bradford) for the past four seasons. He quarterbacked the Sooners to the 2000 national title.

Dykes’ departure would be the second big blow for the Arizona offense in the past week. Tight end Rob Gronkowski announced Friday he was leaving early to enter the NFL Draft.

Still, Arizona loses only two seniors starters on offense — receiver Terrell Turner and left tackle Mike Diaz.

Pete Carroll‘s decision to leave USC for the Seattle Seahawks could adversely affect Arizona.

The Trojans went out and hired Lane Kiffin from Tennessee, which brought in Derek Dooley from Louisiana Tech, which will announce the hiring of Wildcats’ offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes this afternoon, according to NewOrleans.com.

Louisiana Tech has called a news conference for 4 p.m. Tucson time this afternoon.

One of Dykes’ first coaching jobs, in 1998, was as a receivers coach at Northeast Louisiana (now Louisiana-Monroe), which is about 40 minutes away from Louisiana Tech’s campus in Ruston.

If Dykes leaves, that would put Arizona in the unusual position of having to replace both coordinators in the same season. Defensive coordinator Mark Stoops left for the same position to Florida State. Head coach Mike Stoops moved quickly and painlessly to hire Greg Brown from Colorado to be co-coordinator with well-respected linebackers coach Tim Kish.

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.

UA-UCLA game blog

Arizona coach Mike Stoops said after Saturday’s 27-13 victory over UCLA that starting running back Nic Grigsby and third-string back Greg Nwoko each suffered sprains of the AC shoulder joint during the game.

For Grigsby, it’s an aggravation of an injury he has been playing with for a few weeks. He left the game in the first half. Nwoko left the game late in the third quarter and had his left arm in a sling as he left the field.

“How severe, to what degree, I will know more next week,” Stoops said.

Second-string back Keola Antolin, who didn’t practice late in the week and didn’t play in the first half as he was trying to rest an ankle injury, came in during the second half. He rushed 16 times for 77 yards and made what offensive coordinator Sonny Dykes called the play of the game.

Antolin gained 11 yards on a draw on third-and-10 from the UCLA 36 in the third quarter. Arizona scored on a 25-yard catch-and-run by Juron Criner one play later for a 20-6 lead.

“He still has been bothered by that ankle, but that’s the best he has looked in a while,” Stoops said. “It was good. we needed him. We needed to run the football.”

Fourth-stringer Nick Booth added a 6-yard touchdown run with 34 seconds left in the third quarter for the game’s final points.

Dykes joked that maybe some of UA’s receivers can help at running back; UA did have good luck running several fly sweeps to its wideouts (a combined nine carries for 95 yards). But running back depth could really be an issue for the next game — vs. Washington State on Nov. 7 — and beyond.

Who is behind Booth on the depth chart?

“Open tryouts for running backs,” Dykes joked.

You have to go down to Kylan Butler and Daniel Jenkins, both of whom are true freshmen who are redshirting.

“Hopefully, we won’t get to that point,” Dykes said. “We’ll probably get those guys some reps this week and see who we feel is a little bit further along, and go from there.”

Elsewhere, quarterback Nick Foles was suffering from the flu, which helps explain his mixed night. He threw three interceptions — two on deflected passes — and made a bad handoff exchange with Nwoko for a lost fumble on the first play of the second half. In general, he just wasn’t quite as sharp.

He threw a lateral that linebacker Akeem Ayers broke up and safety Tony Dye scooped up for a touchdown on a fumble return. Dykes said Foles had the option to call a run or a pass on that play, and should have called a run based on the defense.

“We kind of made a bad decision,” Dykes said. “The thing is, we’ve run a thousand of those this year and he’s made the (right) decision probably 98 percent of the time.”

Dykes said Foles seemed to wear down as the game went on, although Foles’ other numbers don’t look bad — 22 of 34 for 247 yards and two touchdowns.

“Probably didn’t play as well as he has been up to this point, but at some point, he was going to have to come back to earth,” Dykes said. “Tonight, he did. It was humbling. The good thing is he was tough enough to overcome it and make enough plays for us to have a chance to win. The defense, obviously, played fantastic.”

Speaking of that defense, it was without starting defensive end Brooks Reed again. Reed has missed almost all of the past four games because of an ankle injury. D’Aundre Reed, who has been playing with a broken hand, started the game in Brooks Reed’s spot, but aggravted the injury and came out in favor of Apai Tuihalamaka.

Stoops said the goal is to get Brooks Reed healthy during the bye week and especially have him ready to go for a rugged finish to the season — at Cal, vs. Oregon, at ASU, at USC.

“We’re trying to get Brooks back to full strength,” Stoops said. “The back end of our schedule, there is a lot there.”