Nowhere To Run
Arizona's rushing defense ranked last in the Pac-12 entering Saturday's contest. Lane Kiffin said he abandoned the run because he expected the Wildcats to work all week in practice on shoring up their run defense. That's why USC threw 39 passes, he said.
Did he realize how BAD the run defense was against all FBS schools they faced? Even NAU looked ok. Sure those teams had passing success against UA as well but they realized that by running they kept the UA offense off the field. Knowing how bad our defense was why would you expose them to even the mediocre offense of UA? UA is one of the worst teams in the country on both sides of the ball but Foles isn't bad. So why give him a chance for one man heroics on a bad SC pass defense scheme? Surely Lane can see what every other coach saw. Oh well, maybe this was about making it interesting, like playing a dud like Minnesota and having to pull it out with special teams. Thankfully that has continued to be a relative bright spot no matter what else goes on.
Odd, I don't understand why he just didn't mention that they were completing 82% of their passes for 12 yards a pop. If you never have to punt, why change up the game plan? Barkley had a 162 passer rating, a B- in Wolf's opinion, but that seems like a hot enough hand to ride all game long.
Wolf's rating is crazy. I don't know if Wolf is making the same point as me.
My point was that Arizona was also giving up similar or better passing completion to other teams but those teams still decided to go with the run.
Why? The same reason it was such a close game, i.e., running the ball helps keep the other team's offense off the field, and drastically reduces the chance a passing offense can keep up with you. That's obviously not a new piece of knowledge.
His statement just solidifies the gameplanner & caller he is today. There isn't a coaching staff alive that can immediately correct a bad rushing defense in one week. Come On! He is going to promote & call Barkley & Woods plays until hell freezes over no matter what the defense on the other side is set up in. Tyler probably could have had a good rushing game if it wasn't for the ignorance of his head coach. I bet you see Arizona's next conference foe rushing their asses off!