This is I on the Wall with Steve Rivera and Jagonzale Sound Fox Sports fourteen fifteen powered by Nova Insurance Services and Sure Your Most Prized Possessions kt z R two SAD and iHeartRadio Station. Hey, good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifteen. I'm Steve Rivera. He's jagins As. All we have is each other. Jay, It's a couple of sleepy guys in here. Man, you guys, we could have
just taken the week off. Some quick turnarounds over the weekend. Yes, a lot of games you went too a few, yeah, you know, went too well. Had the nine o'clock Friday night game. Saw Dave Heiky after the game, and I asked him if I could just put my car on the lawn and spend the night there on the tailgate lawn. He politely said no. So I went home and I was back at seven o'clock in the morning, and you know, we tailgated and did the game, and
then another game yesterday afternoon at four o'clock. Long weekends for bost of us, you know what, let's say, you know, for for you know, you go to those events. You see all the same people right the staff, you know, all the same people were all doing the work. You know, Mike Hargrove, who's the you know, the facilities guy,
you know at the at the arena. You know, my poor my poor daughter had to work a volleyball game on Friday, then the Friday night game, then the football game Saturday, a volleyball game on Sunday, and then the Sunday game. All those people worked all those games and and it was you know, there's a lot of stuff going on over They don't talk about the glamour's part of it. It's not, it's not. That's the hard part of it. You got to sit on the sidelines. How cool.
And the guys are great, aren't except the fact that you know, some of those folks got there at you know, nine o'clock in the morning on on on Friday, on Friday, and didn't leave until midnight. Quit your bitching, man, quit your bitching. You got it easy dream job. People are going to school for this job. But what a weekend, right, one of the better weekends in the weekend. Friday night, they went
big. Yeah, okay, I'm gonna give you a platform here Okay, so you could do whatever you I'm gonna let you bitch a little bit more. Well, you know, I've been thinking about that. I've got a fan rant. I mean, what the hell is up with the with fans? Tommy Lloyd called him out, Yeah, Dave, he called him out during during the during the during the football game. Where are you going get back here? It's a great game. What are you doing? Why didn't
you show up in the first place? And that was my deal? Right once again? Once again, Steve. You know these people bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch about these night games. Bitch bitch. Oh it's too late. I get home too late. You know they're on. I'm just gonna say, I'm watching you give him a twelve thirty game. A beautiful day. I get it. A storm came in and the but you didn't know that when the game started it was beautiful. It was seventy degrees,
the sun was out. They said it was a sellout, and the place was half empty. I took a picture five minutes before the game when the team's about to come out on the field and the upper deck was half empty. Where what you like our side was? Okay, I did see I see our I saw on our side during the you know, I watched the games. Side the east side it was full, west side, the west side it was full. Okay, it was pretty full. But the east
and the end zones. Where the f were you? Okay, you got a winner, you got a ranked team playing another ranked team that you never beat. You're favored. Okay, you're going for your eighth win unexpectedly, a team that comes out of order to do this. Where the f were you? Now? Okay, here's the here's the here's the the crux of my bitch. If Jedfish takes another right, there's only there's go. This is one of the reasons he encourages it. Every He starts every press conference
selling tickets, buy tickets, get out there. You're missing something he doesn't beg but he sells every press conference, every single press conference, and people say, well, we'll come when you start winning. They're freaking winning. Well, I've said there there. I've written this story a few times fickle Arizona fans, and it's hard to make them happy. It's just what it is. What do you think that what do you think that bottom line is
with them? Because you've seen it you've seen it forever. The bottom line, Steve, is our fans suck. They just suck. That's how you start. They're never going to be happy. That's how you start the story. They just suck. And then you just bullet point the rest of it. Right, and then again, you know this happened a couple of years ago. You know, they they were bitching about all the night games. Then they're a great day game and the play nobody came. Well, it's
funny because I didn't know this. I was too busy with my weekend stuff with a tour, but I didn't know that Tommy had called out the fans on Friday, right, and then Friday night the places the place is half ampy. So this is this is what I'm not surprised because he did this last year or the year before and he says, well, you guys, consider yourselves college basketball fans. Where are you? And then fans freak out?
He called what what somebody's calling us out? Yeah for a reason, Steve, yesterday the zonus Zo was half full, Yeah, half full. The upper deck was empty and it was about ten or twelve rows into. The lower deck was empty. So how many times I've been here thirty five years, You've been here all your life, and all you hear is, Okay, the blue hairs blah blah blah. Well the blue hairs are passed.
The new blue hairs are there because we're the blue hairs now. Okay, So they want to move the kids on the side sideline blah blah blah. Where are the kids gonna go there? They ain't gonna show up for them either, Right, It's just it's frustrating because we talked talk about how this team, Okay, you win, you'll you win, will show you win, will show you start winning, I'll start coming. Well, where the hell were you? Right? There was no reason to not be at
the Utah game zero, you know, I get it. El Tour was going on and maybe that you know, that's not that's a different crowd, totally different on it. There's no way, okay, there was no traffic issues, right, No, you know, you know two weeks ago or the the U c l A game, I got, you know, I got. I got to the tailgate area half hour after the open. I barely got on the lawn. I barely got on the makaylon. I showed up at the same thing. You know, half hour after the open,
I was in the third row. You know, nobody was there, Like, where the hell were you again? It just it just drives me nuts. It just drives me nuts. You know, Tucson wants a winner. They give you a winner, and you say, well maybe next year. Yeah I got too much to do. Yeah maybe next year. Yeah. Not. I hear you, I hear you, And well I applaud you because you're ripping your own people. And let's not forget. And let's not
forget as mt as the place was. They gave away a bunch of tickets, right, they gave away they every season ticket holder had an opportunity to get two free tickets. All right, I got two tickets and you know we brought some people to the game. What the hell is going on? Well? I think that was part of Tommy's thing too. It's just if you have tickets and aren't using them, give them to give them to somebody
else who wants to go to the game. Exactly. But the thing about is, you know this, I mean, it's a it's a it's a strong voice on Twitter and Facebook and blah blah blah. A lot of the bitching and complaining and and the loud voices. But they don't go. They don't go. Don't Oh no, we were big fans, but you don't go. But here's the tickets are too tough. Well, there's tickets. Both Tommy and and Jed are doing their part. They're doing their party.
You know, let's say Jed's built the winner. It's unbelievable, it's done. They're they're you know, they're winning programs now and they're gonna be one of the favorites. And Jay, whether he's here or not, he's proven it can be to look at how fast it is, right right, look at how fast this happened. There is proof of your resume shows it. Uh this year, no one thought it, but it's here, maybe Jake Fisher, but it's it's happened, and now we'll see what happens from it.
Remember my eight what is that now? For ten wins? It looks pretty about seventy five percent? It's what are they ad now? Wins? He win's yepp. But to get away to yeah, so Sam, I want to know it depends what they played the bully so but yeah, but you're you're getting closer your probability of getting it. It's pretty good. Look if ten wins, Steve, it's only been done four times. It's hey, he should run for mayor, he could run for Southern Arizona whatever.
If you who's going to vote for because nobody knows who the hell he is or where what is? No, it's it's very they want but they don't know they want, but they don't know. Come on, that's the world, man, I would I would live it started the game. Well, you know, I will say this because you know everyone knows I'll tour and uh this weekend. Uh. We we do it every year, right, same time. You would understand because we talked about on the radio, right
yeah. Uh, And and people can understand it's one year and one one day of a year, but they don't know until it happened, until it affects them, right and the other pist kind it doesn't work that way. But we tell them, come to the game. We're good. Come to the game, we're good. I'm talking to know that bad. Come to the game. Maybe I'll come next year. Yeah, did you have a problem with them storty to story the field again? I kind of wish they
hadn't, But what the hell right, what the hell? You know? Three times? Three times? Okay, okay, next year when again, when whenever's win some games, let's not from the field like you've been there, right, act like you've been there. I'm kind of one of those believers in that, right, you know. But you know, you know it's the same, it's the same mentality of trashing the downtown area after journeying
over of cars, Right, why do you do that? But I you know, I was okay, it's fine, but you know what, it was cold and it was starting to raising. It wasn't good. It was the wind was howling inside your in sheer area, right, yeah, because of the win, but yeah, because when it was raining. Okay, I you know, I had a ring pointer, so I wasn't getting wet, but I had the puntra but it was cold because it was it was so windy. But we haven't even talked about the game. Yeah, we
haven't talked about the game. We have a good show, though, yeah, we do. We do. What do we have a Bear Baker? He was the special teams captain on that ninety eight twelve and one team. Yeah, we'll talk to him a little bit about getting ready for this a SU game and just what what that was like? You still that team still stands as the best team ever. We'll talk about that period. You turn, you turn a couple of games in the in this season around in this
team is right up there, right up there with that team. And then uh, man, we're talking him about Hell, he was on the call last night. Uh he's been twice now, twelve networks. You want to get his impression of of uh, you know what he's seen from from the Cats, Steve, They're good. There's no question. Did you read me today? Yeah? And I went to the talk to the car. I was the only one that went to talked to. I went to because I
knew. I knew I was gonna be the only one one, and I knew what he was gonna say given his back right and now, had he played that at Chapman College or whatever, I would never would have done that. But he he was at Kentucky before he got here, and I'm thinking this guy might say something, and he did, and he did, and he did and he's right. I mean, I'm not sure if he's right for the five four, but it has every ingredient you want. They got
all the bases covered. Yeah, even the bench of the bench yeah covered. Yeah, yeah, you know, you know, you bring in Moroscos and Borovich for for right a couple of minutes, three for minutes, and then they go, you know stuff right. No, This the thing about it, Jay, is there's the problem because I hear this every time time again, I'm sure you have to. Well, Lout had some pretty good teams out coming, didn't win more championships. Guess what other teams. Duke's
pretty good, Kentucky's pretty good, Kansas is pretty good. They have things to do to you. You get up there and you gotta you gotta get lucky and good and be good on that, on that and not get hurt. Everyone talks about Ashley, right, stuff happened to right, you know, Gilbert Arena skating hurt, writing hurt, Gilbert Rena skating hurt, turned the uh you know during that final four, you know, just stuff like that, right, So, you know, but they're really good. But
you know what it the Arizona football team. I'm gonna you know, I'm gonna say it, Steve, I think I people might people might disagree with me or Mike or as you often say, I might be overstating things, overacting things. Arizona's the top ten teams in the country right now. Yeah, I don't know, because it's hard to measure them. But let me tell you something. Even Mikey me, I mean Mikey likes it because that Washing USC game kind of said. Okay, and then the Washington States of
God, these guys are good. You know. Yeah, you know, I'm sitting here thinking, if I'm Washington, I don't want Arizona to have another shot at me. No, no, right, and I backf championship game. No, and then uh, and I don't think he's I think that's very capable of winning that game. Okay, let's go down the list.
Okay, these are these are the real quest got a minute. I don't know if I've seen enough of a one one through one through for Georgia, Ohio State, Michigan, Washington. Okay, a Zon's not better than any of those. Florida State, especially with the quarterback. Certain Arizona can beat the Oregon probably not, but you know they'd give him a hell of a game. Texas Arizona can beat them, Alabama, probably not. Louisville Arizona can beat them, Missouri Arizona can beat them. I'd be put them
up against Penn State. Then you go after that old miss O or or Oklahoma l s U. You know, I'll put it. I don't know that there's going to beat all of them, but I think they can. This has to be in your your mind because I don't even been here and I don't follow football like I did a new for basketball. The most surprising seasons you've ever witnessed? Yeah, could you even think about the first one? I don't know how many of us saw the twelve and one ninety eighteen
coming. You know, remember ninety seven they'd gone like six and five and they need ASU and snuck into a bolt predict this, Yeah, I don't remember. You know, they started winning game. But you know, this team didn't look all that great at the start of the season, you know, And I tried to ask Jed then. I don't think he liked what I asked him about the slow starts and stuff. But you know, they
didn't look all that great. And they were they were, you know, they were what they thought where we thought they were going to be on after the first six games, come on, they were three and three. I was thinking about this today. The circumstances of events de Laura getting hurt, Flafida coming in right, uh, the Wiley getting her, Jonah coming in
and playing more. These little things that happened, that just happened. Sometimes you take a ride at Albuquerque and you end up in the right place exactly, I mean, just because it was a roadblock somewhere. Yeah, exactly. And that's what they've done, which is just crazy. Yes, I don't know that there's been a bigger surprise in Arizona football. You have to reduce some research. But I don't know my time here because this was totally
unexpected. And he should if if anybody's paying well, we smoked him today, right, excuse we spoke to him today. He hit something on the top of the head with a question about Arizona. No one's, no one's everyone's not paying attention or whatever. Welcome to Arizona, bast Arizona football. Right, all right, let's take our break. We're gonna come back. Barrett Baker, who was on that ninety eight twelve and one team, he
was the special teams captain of that that year. We'll talk to him about, you know, finish shaving off ninety seven and then going into ninety eight and when he thought that was gonna happen. So stick around for all that. We'll be right back. Steve Rivera here to talk about Dorato Rock and Materials. I needed a lot of gravel for my driveway, so I called Eric at Dorato Rock. He found out the amount and color I needed and boom, it was taken care of and at a great price. How do
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forty seven. Go to azypest dot com to schedule your free evaluation. Today. Streamy Live, I Mean iHeartRadio WAPP. This is I on the Ball with Steve Brabera and Jacin Salez. Sports fourteenth Fiftay, Hey, welcome back to Ian the Ball Here. Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Stive Rivera, He's Jagins Aws. Now on the phone, we have Baker from the ninety seven ninety eight football team at Juba, probably one of the better ones that we've seen in a long time. Barrett, how are you doing, oh
Man? Just excited that obviously had a great win Saturday, a lot of momentum coming into the big game on the upcoming Saturday, So great time to be a Wildcat. You know, a lot of people in town and obviously a lot of people know that you played for that team. Do you get into a lot of conversations from there and about about this team being compared to that team? You know, I would say that you get into a little bit of a recency bias and where anything today is better than it was in
yesteryear, if that makes sense. And I'm all for that, because at the end of the day, when you wore the uniform, you just want success for it. And to watch those kids be able to sing bear down in a winning locker room, I wish they could do that every week. So I'm excited about the fact that at some point we are now actually talking about this version of the Arizona Wildcats compared to some of the better teams that we've had specifically ninety three and ninety eight. So for them to actually be
relevant, that's what's exciting I think as a fan. You know that after twenty years of we had some decent teams in there with the twenty fourteen squad obviously, but we are trending in the right direction, and the fact that Arizona football seems to be relevant again. As an alum, that's exciting for
us part. Just you know, in terms of comparing, right, you know, you guys decent season in ninety seventy one, seven and five, but the big thing was you beat ASU, you know in that you know, the year after getting born after you know, ACU came in and blasted
air Zone on their way to the Rose Bowl. Then, so leading into the ninety eight season, how much did that help you guys in the off season to kind of get have being a say, a better frame of mind went into ninety eight And how much do you think that had to do with what you guys did eight? And did you see this see did you see this coming exactly? Well, I think going back to that nineties, I'll go ahead, Steve, no, no, did you see that coming?
Like just I think when we lost in overtime to Washington State in ninety seven on the road, and that was Washington State's rose bull team. But we gave them everything and more, and we probably should have won that game if we If we scored on our two point conversion, that changed things for us. At that point. We barely lost to Ohio State played them very tough, so we had some building blocks in ninety seven and it seemed like we
were holding ourselves back a little bit. I'll never forget going into Sun Devil Stadium on Friday night and excuse me on Thanksgiving night and basically coach told me, telling us this is where it's going to happen then, and they had a good team. They were supposed to be going on a Fiesta Bowl and we knocked them off, and that momentum carried out through the inside dot Com Bow and I think we finished with four wins in a row, and we
knew that we had the building box there. We worked our butts off that summer and we had the pieces in place and it was just a matter of pushing the right buttons. And there are similarities with this team. To go from one to eleven to five and seven to I won't jinx it. But what should we be at the end of the season, right, we should be nine and three going into a bowl game that they can feel it.
The one thing I would caution everybody about is that each team is a team in and of itself, and it's so difficult to forecast next year's success based off this year because we just don't know the chemistry, the moving parts, if everyone's coming back, if they're injury free. You know, there's so much that goes into that. But yeah, we knew we had something special. I think this team has a great chemistry and they've got something special in
that locker room, and I think we're seeing that every Saturday. Yeah, so when you're on the sidelines, what do you see? Can you see the chemistry, see the just the unbelievable things that we probably don't see. Ye. I think I'll give coach Fish credit. I mean, he's just an open book when it comes to making the alumni feel part of the program. And so you know, we've got to give a twenty four hour notice, I'll say, but he is so awesome about letting us go and watch
practice. So when I've gone to practice, you know, and you hear coach Akina yelling and everybody in a positive way. And you see guys ten weeks or eleven weeks or twelve weeks into a season that are still running around and having fun at practice. That says a lot because practice is tough. You're physically beat up. You've been doing this since August, and how do you keep pushing through that and putting your best effort into the field on Saturdays? But man, we do it. We show up and we are ready
to go every Saturday. So they're doing something I think you know in Canner McLaughlan, I wouldn't say that we lucked into finding that kid, but obviously, you know, coming from Southern Utah transferring in rehabbing from a knee injury. Would we have forecasted him a year and a half ago that he was
going to be the VIP or MVP type of player that he's been. And yet he's a great teammate, you know, Anthony Ward busting his butt year in or week in and week out on special teams and then boom making a play that has such a huge impact. Right if we pulled one hundred percent of our fan base, and that's not a shot at him. But ninety seven percent aren't going to know who after they award is. A three percent might know, oh, that's Isaiah Ward's brother, right, They don't even
know if there's a connection there. But we know who number fifty seven is today because he had such a huge impact on the outcome of last Saturday's game. And for a kid like that to be rewarded and getting a scholarship, you know, those are the program building chemistry things that you have to have
and coach Fish and his staff have done a great job doing that. So that we Steve and I have talked about often is this whole idea of chemistry, and you talked a lot about that that you know there there have been teams in any sport at any level that have great talent, you just incredible rosters, and have no chemistry and they don't farewell, whereas a team that does have great chemistry doesn't even have to have the best players on the field
every every game, and yet they can do things. I mean, how you know you were in the locker room, what you know what makes great chemistry? And how is that more important than almost anything that you know? It starts with unselfishness and there's twenty two kids on the team that are starters and happy and about eighty that have to push right because they're practicing just as hard they're doing the scout team. They're the backup that's waiting for their chance.
So you have to buy into the team, the team, the team. And that's what coach told me was so great about, right, we don't know where, we don't know who, we don't know when, but some wildcat's going to make a play. And this team, I feel like they echo that same thing because when these backups have gotten a chance to step in and take care of business, there's no drop off. They're ready to seize the moment. And so it really starts with that unselfishness and then the
fact that you just love it when another teammate does something good. Right, When you see a teammate that has individual success but that individual success helps the team, then it's just a wildfire that spreads the right way. And so I think when you see that on the sidelines, you know somebody makes it play man, that sideline is jacked up. They are excited, And I keep going back to that unselfishness, But like if you take a look at I hate to use myself as an example, but I was a walk on.
They had two years of eligibility and after getting a scholarship from coach Tolmy, which is awesome. My teammates said, that's a kid that we want to be our team captain. Well, who in the world would have a walk on become a team captain. That says everything about the ninety seven guys that pick them right, because now it's not what you were, it's what you are and what do you bring every day to the table to help your
team. And this team does the same thing. They don't care if you were a walk on from this or a transfer from that, or a two star kid or a five star kid. You're all wildcats one to one hundred. And when you see the same thing Nos Bombada going in and reaking havoc, you know, and getting praised by his teammates for a guy that you know, DJ Warnell, There's just you could go down that roster and find guys that aren't necessarily t MAC, but man, they have a huge impact
on the program behind the scenes as well. And that's what it takes, is that just one hundred from one to one hundred, rowing in the same direction, putting in that effort, and then obviously, yes, you do have t Mac, you do have Jonah Coleman, you do have fufet it. You know, you got all those guys that when the game needs to have an impact play, they step up and they do it. And that's that's obviously very necessary as well. Do you can we get you for one
more minute? Yeah? Sure, so okay, because it's three thirty and I need to go. But when did you when did you see this team become this team? There had to be a point how would I describe this? I talked to a teammate earlier this year, one of the kids on the team earlier this year. When you are coming off of one and eleven season and then you're five and seven, do you truly know how to win
games yet? Right? And the answer is no. But when you battle and you go on the road against Mississippi State and unfortunately, you know, we weren't able to pull that game off, But then you punch USC in the mouth and you know that was just a fluke that we didn't come out of that game with a win. But when you're going toe to toe with these teams and you're saying, Yep, we can do this, and then all of a sudden, you get that victory, and then you get that
next victory. Now you know that you are legitimate. And so I think we had to convince ourselves that we were the big dogs and that we were the ones that if Oregon State comes into our house, that we're going to beat them, and we're not going to think that we can beat them. We're going to know that we can beat them. So looking in the mirror one to one hundred and realizing that every guy said we're the Arizona Wildcats and it's twenty twenty three and this is our team, and every time we take
the field, we are going to win. That expectation of winning you have to grow into that twenty five years ago. Jay, to your point, I think that we found that late in the season and it carried on to the next season, and I think mid season, right all of a sudden, it's like, no, we're the guys. They're going to try to beat us, but it's not going to happen. We're going to beat them, and when we take the field, we knew that we were going to
beat them. And I think that you see that now that we go out there and to jump on Utah, who is an established program for the last fifteen years, and man, they didn't know what happened to them. And that just shows a growth in the program of believing in ourselves and knowing to expect, expect to win, not think you can win, expect to win. Well. Well, thank you Brett for coming on today. You sharing me a lot of Thank you so much. Hey, bear down on Saturday,
guys, I've finished this thing out. Get to nine and three and then go get a great ball. Great, great, great to hear from you, Barrett, Thank you, thanks a un all right, bear down, guys, good stuff, good stuff. The funny thing about it, Barrett's you know, former walk on scholarship guy. How many of those dudes are like him on this team, right, there's a bunch of them, a bunch of those dudes that you say, what that dude, but he's kicking your ass and they did. Man, that was something on Saturday.
Okay, let's take our break. We'll come back talk more about the game on Saturday, and then Jed clips. We got some Jeed clips from the press conference today. Talked about a lot of that stuff. So stick around for that. We'll be right back. If you're an Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for nearly forty years. Now take a look
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job or a second income. Come be a part of a winning team the A Team apply online today at A teamsecurity dot net. This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jay Gonzalez sound Fox Sports fourteen to fifteen. Subscribe now to the podcast on the iHeartRadio app Just Surgeon I on the Ball. Hey, welcome back to Why the Ball Here Fox Sports fortune and fifty. I'm Steve, he's Jay. You have about fifteen minutes left. I will talk up to each other. Maybe take a call. We would love
to take your call to each other. That would be a first and then take your calls and we're gonna listen to Jed. Today. We spent a few minutes right. Well, there's so much going on, Steve, especially with what's happening with football and basketball. So yeah, I've had my fan rand I'm done with that. So no one called you, but they're gonna yell at me. I'm gonna yell that at home for being no. But that's it's true, Jay, I mean, how do you the thing?
The thing I like about it because just because Tommy has done this before, he called them out, and because everyone thinks they're the poop for the poop, we're the poop. We're Wildcats basketball program. Well show up. You can say all you want about yourself, but show up up, show up.
Yeah. All right, So a lot of a lot of different things in the press conference today, one of them being just Jed was asked out, you know, how do you keep your team from being over confident in this game against a su You know, as you've got slaughtered over the weekend again, Arizona's beating the hell out of everybody, and how do you how do you fight that off headed into this game? And here's what you had to say about that. Oh, there, there's no overconfidence with this team.
This team I've you know, I've shared with them, like we you know, there's not a lot of people out there that talk about our program, a lot a lot of people out there that talk about our team. Our guys are just you know, scrappy and hard nosed and passed over by a lot of programs to come here, and we like it that way. So we're going to continue to live in that world, remind ourselves of that and you know, do everything we can to get to this next win.
But if we can get there, you know, on Saturday, to get to no, that's great. But for us, it's just a matter of always remembering where we came from. So so when he said that, I kind of picked my eyes up and that said that describes Arizona football to a team not today all the time, what this team has And correct me if I'm wrong, Jake, because you know this better than me. They've had the scrappy dudes forever. Right now they have some guys who are very good
sprinkled in. So those sprinkled in dudes are making the other dudes play hard and play tough because they don't they don't want to disappoint each other, right, so they play as a team. And that's this team. That's this team. Well, like bart Baker said, you know our guests. You know, last segment he said, you know, Arizona's always had those blue collars, but now Jed is gone out and gotten you know all you know North Jonah Coleman, who those guys are really really good college football players.
They're not and they're not the blue collar underdog kind of guys. Those are guys. Those are top of the line players. Say, No, fa Ft has proven that you know that he's well, well he's short, he's really really good college quarterback. He's a college good college quarterback. No, he is. You know what two is. I think they've built the program here that's worthy of staying. You know, the Dorian singers are gonna leave. The scooter spots are not gonna leave because they see bigger, brighter lights
somewhere else. I'm not saying that's gonna not gonna happen. But you like this situation? Now, how do those three USC guys who transferred from here at field today? Someone said, we tell them their coach is going to be on the hot seat. Dorian Singer cut thirteen passes this year. Now he's a junior. He's gonna be back next year. And maybe he's you know, more a piece of it and whatever it is, maybe it's all worth whatever nil money they got. But those three guys are on seven and
five team Arizona. They could be in the New Year six Bowl if they get themselves into the Pac twelve championship game, which is not out of the realm of possibility. You know, I don't think it's gonna happen, but it can. But either even so, Arizona could be nine to three and everybody's talking about and the only the people that are talking about USC are talking about what a crappy season, right right? Be careful what you wish for.
Sometimes it doesn't work out. You know, how does Dorian Singer feel about playing in a bowl game without the quarter heisom Trophy winning quarterback that he went to play for. Because again I say, there's no way in hell, KILEB. Williams is gonna play another game. I don't know this problem. I'll never know this problem. But more money, more problems. Us. See, you do you have the wealth of wealth, of talent and all that. Now guess what you got to live up to it. And
if you don't, people people will say, what the hell happened? You do? I brought up I brought up the issue of Arizona slow starts, you know, early in the year, which they did they have slow starts, you know, Jed, Well, I'll just say we'll play what Jed said, because since the USC game and then all the way up to what happened on Saturday, the blitz that they put on Utah. Yeah, I mean, we just don't see. You've just not seen anything like that,
right against a team of that quality. They've done that to NAU and Idaho State whatever, but a team of Utah's quality to do what they did, to go up twenty eight to nothing in no time flat, that was crazy. And I just thought, did something change about what you guys were doing? What he said? Now, I think you guys were more focusing on
the slow starts than I was. Really. I know that there was a couple of games that we only had two possessions in the quarter, and then we scored the first possession of the second quarter, and we scored against NAU. I know we all talk about the Mississippi State game, you know that we wound up going down fourteen to nothing there and then utap. I think we had a chance to score in the second I think with the second drive and then we fumbled the ball. So I don't know, I just think
it kind of happened that way. I think it was kind of meant to just as the year went on. I think we were just going to get to a spot where we don't punt a lot. We try not to pun a lot, and I think we just early on maybe we didn't hit on a couple of things. But I never really saw it as big of a problem. As kind of got addressed. But I don't think it's a big deal. Well, of course now things are going well, No, it
give may have been, but they've solved it. We talked about this in basketball all the time to remember when they slow started and blah blah blah. Yeah, I know what you're going with it. Well, again, what they were talking about that though, you know, they just didn't get off, They didn't get out of the out of the out of the gate those first few games. You know, well, who's the quarterback? Yeah,
I mean honestly, yeah, you switched. You switched a few things, putting you spark plugs in the car and maybe a little bit maybe he thought that's what I was fishing for, and I wasn't at all. It was just like, well, you know what happened that Maybe he was, but it was wasn't. He doesn't know. Well I just thought of that just
now. Yeah, because because there was a change. Yeah, and and and and who do who gave me some old Lamont gave me grief about they played harder for Whether whether it's true or not, there was some change that happened. Something something something, something got different. Yes, what was it? Yes? All right? Jed was asked, you know, how how long did it take for somebody to tell you how important the game is?
And he had he had an interesting answer to that. I mean, it was a huge part really, even early on when I met with the I think that first day I did a zoom call with former athletes that coach Sanders headed up before he was on the staff. Dave got me in touch with I think it was with Brandon Sanders, and had about seventy five but football alumni on and I was, you know, my job was to introduce myself to them, and I think their job was to kind of inform me a
little bit about the history of Arizona football. And clearly the game itself of the Territorial Cup is one of the most important parts of Arizona football. So probably that day, day one, it was brought to my attention. And then Teddy came to breakfast, as you guys all know that story the next day, and I talked to him a little bit about the importance of the game, and we've not we certainly I recognize the importance of the game because I know that I was hired after it. So is that that's it?
Right? So? So are you surprised about the spread? Oh, I mean it was ten yesterday. I I'm surprised it's that low. Me too, Yeah, me too, unless, of course, you know, it's a rivalry game and blah blah blah, But me too, Yeah, I you know, yeah, I'm surprised that's that, love, because I think that the the disparity between the two teams is very apparent. Yeah, well,
hey, look as she played. They played a nice game against Washington, right, remember that game, close game, but Utah beat the hell out of them, or can beat the hell out of them, and they're depleted, you know, and they're depleted. You know, they had a running back, you know, taking snaps at quarterback last week. I mean it's just you know, there, there's so much there. We only had fourteen minutes with him. We could have spent a half hour. I know
we could have. Because I'm assuming, I'm assuming that Jed ces a issue a lot like U of A was two years ago. Yeah, near the bottom, near the bottom, trying to work itself out and with a young with a young coach with the who's inspiring or whatever word that is all right, and I think he expects as to come out like his team came out. Yeah, you know, not just last not just you know, his first year, but last year too. Now, his first year they were
helpless, right, they didn't have guys. But last year they came out and you know, they won that game. And get to the point that I made you try to make with with with Barrett Baker and how much momentum did they get from that win, Yeah, to go into this season and kind of believing themselves. And then here's the second thing, or maybe thirteen I felt there was interesting the billboard or and he didn't say much. Uh, he didn't even he didn't say much about it. All he had to
do was say the billboard the billboard. I don't remember. I'm not sure where he said that, but he did the reminder. I think it might have been Jenny's uh yeah, yeah, I think's question. I think could have been, but he did. He did talk about the fact that there are some guys on who are on that twenty twenty team they got beat seventy to seven. Who are there? He he he's not unhappy that they're that they're thinking about that. Well, what did you think about what he did
to Utah Saturday? I initally thought it was kind of from me, but then he almost immediately thought, wait a minute. He did that for jayde
and de Laura. He wants Jaden de Laura to have something. When did you realize that or think probably about when you were just no, no, no, just a couple of minutes after the play, Okay, I thought, I thought, wait a minute he did, you know, he wanted he wanted to Laura and I and I listened to the postgame show to see if he said that infect it so so that brings me to my point. He's not a guy who will not do that, right, you know what I'm saying, right, and you know, and I liked, I liked
how how the Utah you know coaches responded to it. Waitningham basically said, hey, you know, Jed gets to do what he gets to do, and we had it's up to us to defend it. And then there was a lot of things because if you saw him on the team coach broadcast, the defensive coordner just kind of walked by Jed. He said, I didn't see him. He said, I would have. The coach said, the
defensive corder, okay, because somebody tweeted, I saw somebody tweeted. There was a blow by head and then he came back and he responded to that guy and he said, look, I respected, but I didn't see Jed fish. If I had seen him, i'd have shaken shig his hand. And I congratulated. That makes sense, and he said I had no problem with that makes sense. And like I always say to you. And then the Sean Miller rule of if you don't want the court stormed, what do
you do? You don't let him storm the court. You don't let him beat him, you don't let him know that. The Utah coaches handled it exactly like they did. It was the fans were upset, and and then some of our some of airs, the fans were upset saying it was you know, it was low. He should have done that. I knew. I thought that shortly after the past and then I listened to the pro postgame press conference to see was Jed gonna say that? And he infected it makes
sense, totally makes sense. He did say that. Here's here's this tennis player being the love forty love, fifty love. You know. And again, you know, people pointed out that, uh, Utah did that Tarrizona a few years ago, you know, ran a fake punch when they were up by thirty five points or something like that. Look, you know, the guys gonna do what they're gonna do, and they have their keep receipts. Man, this is the Steven Elphins, Steve Alfred, Sean Miller time
out thing. All right, Again, Jed talked about there's thirteen guys who are on the team in twenty twenty who are dealing who are uh uh playing in this game, And he said he's sure they remembered, including Michael Wiley and Jordan Morgan. Yeah, brought to their attention that there was I think thirteen players total that were Arizona Wildcats when the game occurred here in twenty twenty. Of the starters you're talking about, Jordan Morgan, Mike Wiley, Trading
Stokes, and I guess Kyle Austendorp. I think we're the guys that are right now off the top of my head that may not have played in the game in twenty twenty, but are now starting in the game here in twenty twenty three. It means a ton to them. It's a huge part of their legacy. It's a huge part of what they want to get accomplished here before they leave. They do not want to leave here one in three or
one and four, whatever it might have been. They want to make sure they leave here two and two and do everything they possibly can get that done. Yeah. I you know, there's a little piece of me that says they should try and beat in seventy seven to seven. But I don't. Well, you know, the players are gonna do as much as they can to make something like that happen. To make man. But but okay, here's your here's your thing. Because you've seen quirky things throughout the whole thing.
You never know, you never because the gods sometimes show up and say, uh, the underdog, so I'll have the power. And you know, you turn the ball over a few times, you let them be in the game, and then all of a sudden you get to the fourth quarter they're still in the game, and it's like, who's panicking, Sure you are, And some of the freakiest things happens in the game. Right yeah, No, I'm look I to me, it's a just win the game. I don't care how you win it. To win it, I don't
care what the score is. Win the game. They're gonna know. They're gonna know Saturday what happened Friday night with Oregon and Oregon Space. And if they're playing to get in the back Culp Championship game, you know, do you have that clip or done no that they'll pay attention or they're aware or whenever, you probably didn't because you have a minute I think yeah, I think I do. I think I do. Well, you know, we don't have time to play it all. Look play it on the backside.
We've got breaking news coming up. It's uh a lot of stuff going on went over the weekend and we've got you know, we're gonna cover some of that. It some things going on right now and uh there's been a women's basketball game today and all kinds of so stick around for that. We'll be right back crowd street, talking down down, saying bottles this and that, how much you down spare, I swearsh must believe it's all head of SI's better way to check around to the sad