No more scrubs: Arizona awaits No. 9 Washington to open Pac-12 play

They rebounded from a dooming BYU field goal and an 18-point halftime deficit against Grambling State.

The Arizona Wildcats then rolled through Hawaii to close the non-conference schedule, but they begin the Pac-12 season against the second-best conference team by rank. The No. 9 Washington Huskies visit Tucson a year removed from handing Arizona its worst loss of 2015, a 49-3 beatdown in Seattle, as a still-fledgling program under coach Chris Petersen.

History lies with the Wildcats, however. The home team in the series hasn’t lost in the last eight meetings, and it was UA who last earned a road win back in 2007. Arizona is 7-5 against top-10 teams at home since 2005 and has gone 3-1 in such games under head coach Rich Rodriguez.

So maybe the Huskies should be on upset alert.

That will depend on many what-ifs that start with Arizona’s injury report.

This again

As it’s been for the last two weeks, Arizona’s quarterback situation looks complicated heading into gameday.

Never before has Week 1 starter Anu Solomon’s job been in jeopardy to this degree. Solomon is again questionable with a knee injury heading into the game. There’s a likelihood the less-experienced Brandon Dawkins will be facing arguably the Pac-12’s best defense. It’s certainly the best he’s personally faced.

Dawkins had a touch-and-go debut against Grambling State but put together a more impressive outing in a 47-28 win against Hawaii. He completed 16-of-21 passes for 235 yards and a touchdown and has yet to throw an interception in 50 attempts over two games. The sophomore added three rushing scores on 15 attempts that spanned 118 yards last week.

Indeed, he is still drawing the ire of coach Rich Rodriguez, as KVOA’s Ari Alexander detailed this week.

#BearDownBreakdown: Brandon Dawkins is improving on the zone read option, but there are still things to work on – one: selling the fake: pic.twitter.com/YQYuQsAQ91

— Ari Alexander (@AriA1exander) September 19, 2016

Running back Nick Wilson’s injured ankle complicates the matter for Dawkins and the Wildcats. If Wilson (questionable) doesn’t play, freshman J.J. Taylor is the next man up. Maybe more than in the run game after Taylor showed well with 18 carries for 168 yards last week, Arizona’s lack of depth and size at running back (Taylor is jut 5-foot-6 and 170 pounds) could make the Dawkins-led offense more predictable.

Not just a stout defense

Washington has so far rolled three inferior opponents in Rutgers, Idaho and Portland State. Don’t believe that proves anything?

Three years ago, former Huskies coach Steve Sarkisian left Chris Petersen a loaded roster of defensive talent that helped usher in success reasonably quickly.

There’s been little drop-off on that side of the ball despite the high bar that was set, but the major leap forward that many projected for Washington in 2016 was about Petersen’s offensive recruiting rounding into form.

Myles Gaskin is coming off a 1,302-yard rushing season as a freshman, and quarterback Jake Browning this year has shown his sophomore improvements weren’t preseason bluster. Through three games, the UW signal-caller has thrown 12 touchdowns with just one interception and has completed 72 percent of his passes. He’s averaging 10.05 yards per passing attempt.

But the sheer efficiency — offensively and defensively — of how Washington has won in the non-conference season might lead to the conclusion the Wildcats are indeed a huge underdog at home.

Washington is averaging a time of possession of 26:45. That’s only 102nd among 128 teams (Arizona is 118th at 25:23 for what it’s worth) and it becomes impressive next to the fact that the Huskies rank 16th by allowing opponents just 269 yards per game. That’s 178 passing yards (30th) and 91.3 rushing yards (15th) per outing by the opponents who have control of the ball for a relatively significant portion of the game.

Points-wise, Washington’s defense is tied for a third-best total by allowing three opponents to score an average of 10 points per game.

So if we’re talking about being efficient with the ball while keeping the opponent extremely inefficient, few teams can say they do both as well as the Huskies.

Time

7:30 p.m. MST

TV

Pac-12 Network

Follow @kzimmermanaz