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Cardinals tickets wating list call 602-379-0102
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Arizona Makes Troy Earn It!
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Story: Patrick Montgomery for S&E News
Photos: Kevin Pakos |
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| Scroll Down for MORE PHOTOS |
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TUCSON, AZ: First off let me start off that I think the Wildcats played a great game and showed a ton of heart against a bigger, stronger, faster and more polished team. What being said how do you not take advantage of being under estimated? Losing 20 -3 is a victory for the Wildcats but they should have won this game and let me tell you why. If you are a fan of football you might not have seen this but a student of the game would have. Southern California only ran 7 different plays out of 5 different formations. That is how much they respected the Wildcat, not at all.
Pete Carroll said he wasn't the least bit concerned when his third-ranked Trojans took a 3-0 lead into the locker room at halftime Saturday night against Arizona. Nor was he surprised when USC pulled away in the second half for a 20-3 victory, extending their Pac-10 record winning streak to 24 games and setting a record with their 12th straight conference road win.
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It wasn't as exhilarating as many of USC's victories last year, when the Trojans blitzed opponents with a high-powered offense. But it made Carroll every bit as happy. "I love the fact that we're playing defense like this three straight weeks," Carroll said. "We're playing like crazy." The Trojans (3-0) limited Arizona to 154 yards, including minus-16 yards on 19 rushes. Arizona converted only two of 12 third downs.
Now the Wildcat offense had its chances when they got an interception late in the 2nd quarter and bad play calling kept them out of the end zone. Coach Stoops you can’t run against the Trojans. But they were giving you the medium rang pass all game. Now I know you figured that out in the 3rd quarter but a 10-0 lead at half time would have won you the game in my opinion. The Wildcat defense played lights out most of the night. You should take a page out of Larry Smith’s book and win games with defense not try to out score one of the best teams in the country
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Now I know that Jennings is a great story and he was given a scholarship last week so he won’t transfer to ASU next year but come on it was very frustrating to watch him like a sacrifice at the edge of the volcano. He is not the pound the middle runningback that you so need at the U of A. What I saw out of the Stoops camp was traditional football and against Los Angeles’ only professional football team you need to do a better job of getting your game plan put together. Look it is very simple if you are going to play with the big boys you need to lie, cheat and steal and I didn’t see anything like that out of the Wildcats.
The Trojans gained 381 yards. But they would have been in dire trouble without their defense.
USC made its first stand early in the second quarter, after Arizona created the game's first scoring chance. Wildcat cornerback Antoine Cason intercepted a Booty pass and returned it 17 yards to the Trojans 32. Cason grew up 30 minutes from the USC campus in Long Beach, Calif., but was not recruited by the Trojans, and he vowed last week to prove they made a mistake.
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Booty completed 24 of 39 passes for 179 yards and a touchdown. He was intercepted once. But Arizona gained only three yards after the turnover, and USC's Lawrence Jackson blocked Nick Folk's 46-yard field-goal attempt. That set up the first half's lone scoring drive. The Trojans went 47 yards in 10 plays and took a 3-0 lead on Mario Danelo's 35-yard field goal with 8:23 to go in the first half. "We did shoot ourselves in the foot early, and we need to work on coming out faster," Booty said. "We have a lot of room for improvement."
USC mounted its best drive to open the second half. Starting from their own 20, the Trojans went 80 yards in 10 plays. The biggest play was tailback Moody's 40-yard run, the Trojans' longest from scrimmage this season. On the drive's 10th play, Booty threw a 3-yard touchdown pass to Jarrett, who beat Cason in the front corner of the end zone. After stopping Arizona on the next series, the Trojans drove to Arizona's 8 before the drive stalled and Danelo missed a 26-yard field-goal attempt. The miss inspired the Wildcats, who drove 54 yards in 12 plays to make it 10-3 on Folk's 43-yard field goal with 14:05 to go in the fourth quarter.
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Arizona was 0-for-7 on third-down conversions when the drive began, but Willie Tuitama hit Anthony Johnson for 17 yards on third-and-8 from the Wildcat 22. Later in the same drive, Tuitama threaded a 28-yard pass to Syndric Steptoe on third-and-15 from the Arizona 47. USC responded with a 10-play, 64-yard drive that ended in Danelo's 33-yard field goal to give the Trojans a 13-3 lead with 9:43 to play.
The Trojans put the game away when Arizona returner Mike Thomas dropped a punt and USC's Dallas Sartz recovered at the Wildcat 9. Moody scored on the next play to make it 20-3. I do want to mention that Louis Holmes the JC transfer out of Florida is a flat out stud. This guy is a monster and should drive up the I-10 on Sundays and help the Cardinals which need a ton of help but that is a different subject don’t get me started.
It is very simple, if the Wildcats are going to win any games this year they need to do a better job of game preparation and remember who they are playing. If they would have ran the same offence against Stephen F. Austin they would have won by 60 but there is a big difference between a Division II team and a team that could split against the NFC West and beat the Cardinals twice.
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One last thing that I saw and should be addressed is the front line of the Wildcats, now I know they are a tough time but guys take a personal foul or something. Push the guy that just sacked Tuitama for the 5th time or get in his face. I tell you what Wildcats, I know a great line coach that you can have cheap (I wont name him by name but his initials are JP) well that might not work because his team doesn’t listen to him either and they give up 12 sacks a game too.
Up next for the Wildcats is a tough Washington Huskies team coached by what I think is the second best coach in college football Ty Willingham (the first being Pete Carroll). Coach Willingham is the former Notre Dame Coach that got the shaft (shame, shame Notre Dame, hey that rhymes, I am a poet and didn’t even know it). Game time is 7:00pm on Saturday.
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