The offseason is here, with all of Arizona’s sports done for 2023-24 season and the 2024-25 campaigns still a little ways away.
Which makes this a great time to step back and see how all of the Wildcats’ programs are doing, especially with the impending move to the Big 12 Conference.
Over the next few weeks we’ll take a look at each of the UA’s men’s and women’s athletic programs to see what shape they’re in and what prospects they have for the near future. We’ll break down each team and evaluate how it is performing under its current coaching staff, looking at the state of the program before he/she arrived and comparing it to now while also looking at the upcoming debut in the Big 12 and beyond.
First up: Brent Brennan’s football team
How it looked before
Arizona put together one of the best seasons in school history in 2023, winning 10 games including the Alamo Bowl over Oklahoma. And with the bulk of the team expected to return, the sky was the limit for the Wildcats heading into the Big 12.
Then, in seemingly the blink of an eye, everything changed. Jedd Fisch left for Washington, taking his entire offensive staff as well as several key players and plenty of notable incoming recruits. Arizona acted quickly, tabbing Brennan as Fisch’s replacement after seven years at San Jose State.
Brennan had to hit the ground running, first convincing the bulk of the team to give him a shot and then trying to fill out a roster that had more than 20 available scholarships going into spring ball. He also assembled a coaching staff that includes veteran defensive guru Duane Akina and a pair of coordinators who have head coaching experience.
Where things stand now
Considering how bad it could have gone, Arizona’s still in a pretty good place entering 2024. Most super-early rankings still have the Wildcats ranked in the Top 25, and they should be among the top teams in the Big 12’s preseason poll.
Spring ball went well, with no significant injuries—other than projected 1st-round NFL draft pick Tetairoa McMillan injuring his right foot and undergoing “a little procedure” that’s expected to heal in time for fall camps. The UA has since added more than a dozen players via the NCAA transfer portal.
As for Brennan, he’s been a part of every stop Arizona’s athletic department has made on its statewide Wildcat Welcome Tour, meeting fans and answering questions about the program. He doesn’t have to do nearly the same kind of sales that Fisch did three years ago, but there will remain uncertainty about him until he coaches his first game.
What life in the Big 12 should look like
After taking third in the final year of the Pac-12, but without ever winning the conference outright and representing it in the Rose Bowl, Arizona heads into a new league that’s there for the taking. The Big 12’s traditional powers, Oklahoma and Texas, are moving to the SEC which leaves only six schools with a combined 15 appearances in the conference title game, and one of those is fellow Pac-12 addition Colorado.
The UA will actually play 10 Big 12 opponents this fall, with a mid-September trip to Kansas State counting as a nonconference tilt. The Wildcats will visit BYU, TCU, UCF and Utah while hosting ASU, Colorado, Houston, Texas Tech and West Virginia, with future matchups against Baylor, Cincinnati, Iowa State, Kansas and Oklahoma State.
The Big 12 title game is in Arlington, Texas the first weekend in December.
One big question
Will the changes kill the momentum? T-Mac and Noah Fifita are back, as are four starting offensive linemen, the Pac-12’s leading tackler from 2023, almost the entire secondary and one of the best kickers in the country. On paper, that’s a significant amount of returning talent that should be more than enough to make Arizona a contender in the Big 12.
But there was a lot coming back when Kevn Sumlin took over in 2018, inheriting a roster that included Heisman Trophy contender Khalil Tate, Pac-12 Offensive Freshman of the Year JJ Taylor and stud linebacker Colin Schooler, among others. But it took less than one game to see how much Sumlin and his staff—most notably offensive coordinator Noel Mazzone—wanted to do things differently, and that signaled the start of a quick downfall to the program.
Brennan and his staff have pledged to not change too much, at least in the first season, to maximize the positives of its best players. We’ll see if that is really the case when the Wildcats host New Mexico on Aug. 31.
