This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera and Jay Gonzalez sound Fox Sports
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Welcome to I on the Ball here on Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve,
He's Jay. Welcome to Friday. Lot's going on late night game.
We caught my surprise, we have a show. Really, I just came
to Pigure this time. I just care to pick up my paycheck. You're
gonna make me cough? Well, it's Friday finally. Yeah, although it's
been we were black for only the week or four days. Late night last
night it was I are didn't The only thing the shockba was the amount of
points over the difference in points because there was no noo played like it used
to. Well you know, you you you expected and maybe for some Arizona
fans the word is hoped that they would come out the way they did,
right, I thought they would, uh and and and they did. You
know, they can you know, we talked to Reggie Gary yesterday about you
know, did you ever play pissed you? You know, we're ever mad.
When you got onto a court, it didn't look mad as much as
it looked determined that we're not gonna you know, we're not taking any chances.
You know, we saw what we did at Stanford, and we're gonna
do the opposite. And and that's what they did. They came out and
just jumped on them. And so that was that. So so I ran
into your brother coming in and we talked about that, you know, And
it's always it's always this thing, where how did they end up playing like
that and then played like that on Sunday? You know, those two very
different teams. Uh, And we all know it happens every now and again.
My fear my thing is and I don't fear it because you know,
I have no dog here that you oh, they're capable of the bad now
before you didn't think that's and that's yeah. And that's one of the things
that I thought right after the Stanford game is that they've gave They gave the
rest of the league more hope than they had. Right, Oh, hey
we got a chance, yeah, because they looked unbeatable. Yeah, I
mean you're going into the Stanford gave you thought there's anybody in the league who
can beat them. And then not only did Stanford beat they beat them bad.
Now, I mean, you know, ASU who beat Stanford feels like
they can be there as well. Everybody feels like they can beat Arizona at
Stanford. Well, I think that this weekend coming in because Utah has a
good record, Colorado has a good record, you think. In fact,
for people at the game asking me, are they gonna win tonight and said,
oh, yeah, yeah, of course. It means of course,
right, it probably won't even be close, not like this, but we
want to be close. The thing is now when they go on the road,
no, then they don't know right, no, and that and that's
it, and that's the that's to me kind of the thing coming out of
that Stanford game that really can hang around. Did you show you how many
when you worked at TP and you were in boss for a while, how
many people you had under you? Just give me the six or seven.
Okay, so you have six or seven probably capable people, but there was
one that you didn't want to give him assignment too because you didn't know that
they'd pull it off, right, right, So what you do you didn't
give him that task. And this is now Arizona. Should I give him
this task? You don't know. More than likely they'll pull it off.
But just in case he doesn't do it, I better not do it.
Yeah, it doesn't make sense, makes sense, makes some sense. And
you know, and I mean and that that's the deal of Again, that's
the NBA being consistent. Yeah, you don't know what you're gonna get game
to game, right, you know, right, and you know less when
it's football because there's so many more guys involved. But you know when basketball,
you know, a guy can have a shot and not have a shot.
Colin Boswall played well less night. He hasn't played well in a long
term very well. Yeah, and it's maybe just the comforts of home or
whatever. But again, we have we talked about this yesterday. We have
about two hundred and fifty shows a year. If we have a five or
six ten plunkers, Well, it's what it is gonna get. Yeah,
that's what it is. It's hard to play well every day. Did we
bet three thirty three? We're doing okay? Some of the you know,
well, again, you think about, you know, the greatest hitters in
Major League Baseball, don't get a hit seven times out of ten. Yeah,
yeah, right, yeah, and that ill by the guys. This
is kind of who they They're more like this than not like this, right,
so that's what you're more more to see this more often than than what
you saw it. Stand. Okay, so let's kind of we're gonna go
through shot Tommy Lloyd's press conference from last night. Right, it was very
quick, so we're gonna do that. Uh, he is his parents.
I think we're in town with his wife, so that's what they were in
the press room. So yeah, he had a cab to catch It's it's
about a five minute press conference. We cut out a couple of kind of
non relevant questions as far as we're concerned. But so other than that,
here's the whole thing. I'll hear the questions and you'll hear him kind of
short short Steve on the question. Here's here's what he had to say.
Well, I didn't expect that, So happy for the guys. Happy the
guys played well. But you know, I don't know what time we play
on Saturday, but you know we got to be ready. Attention perimeter defense
tonight. K J. Simpson struggled to get any type of open punk talk
about the defense on that tonight. Yeah, I mean, and we're we're
a good defensive team. You know, you got to trust that, and
you know you're gonna have tough nights like we did, and you know,
and and hey, and look at look at some of the shots we made
tonight, banking in three's and things like that. That that that happens,
you know. So we were on the other side of that a few days
ago, and luckily today we flipped it. Specifically, till me up.
Did the offense drive the defense from the defense drive the offense? Well,
I mean, I always want to play complimentary basketball. I mean, I
think your defense has to, you know, compliment your offense, and your
offense has to complement your defense. So I mean, I I don't know.
I mean, yeah, I mean listen, anytime you're playing really good
defense, that can help drive your offense. There's no doubt about that.
So you know, if you're playing with great force on the defensive end,
rebounding and getting in transition, that's usually a good formula this game heading into
the utah GA. I mean, you know what, it doesn't matter.
There's no plus minus in this deal. We want a conference game at home
that we should win. So you know, we got to come out in
Saturday and we play a tough Utah team that's really good, so you know,
we gotta be on edge. You see, Buzz will come out,
come out play what he did. Yeah, I mean I thought Kylin played
well. I mean, guys, Kylin's eighteen, you know, give give
him, give him some have some grace, you know, give him some
space, give him some time, let him develop. I mean that that's
you know that, that's what we're doing. And he played really well today,
and you know, hopefully he can continue to build on it. But
you know, by no means is he a finished product. I think Moe
is fifteen to seventeen from the field. Of the last three games, are
you seeing anything where he's starting to make that next I thought today was his
best game just of overall toughness, effort, energy at both ends of the
floor. I mean, you know, he's he's got to when you're when
you're a seven foot in this program, you're a bad man, and you
gotta play like it, you know, And and he's learning that. He's
a really nice kid, really soft spoken, and you know, he's got
he's got to got a tough en up a little bit, and he showed
that tonight. Did you see that on the defensive side as well. Yeah,
I mean he played his best all around game by far. Not even
importance of having him play those quality minutes. When you have lumar o percent,
it helps us. I mean, now you have forty minutes of really
good five play, you know, play at the five, and which is
something I think if you find advantages at that position, it's gonna it's gonna
really help your team the important So coming out the way you can punching them
early, keep it. I mean, you know, hey, I mean
I don't know, it's great when you do it, but you know,
I also think you got to be comfortable not doing it. And you know
these you know, high level basketball games are not going to be thirty point
margins at half. We got to get really comfortable playing in close ball games
if it's twenty two twenty at that third media timeout, we got to feel
good. And you know that's something we're working on. What can you say
about Utah, And I don't know how much you've looked at them to this
point. I mean, for sure, I mean Utah is a really good
program. You know, man, Craig's done a good job, is you
know, you know, you know obviously last year they really took care of
us at Utah when we got back from Maui, and they played great that
day and it was a little bit like you know, our performance at Stanford,
and so you tipped your hat to him. And he had a good
team last year. He's kind of got a lot of guys back. He's
added a piece or two. You know, they're they're playing with really big,
with a couple of seven footers. Carlson is you know, he's become
a really good player. I mean he's sprinting and hitting threes in movement and
he's hitting right hand jump hooks. You make a mistake, he dunks it
on you. I mean, he's a good ballplayer. So they play him
at the four, and you know, they had the levering kid that was
that Colorado last year at the five. And then they know they have another
five man Kate off the bench, who's tough, so no, they present
a lot of challenge. And then he got a couple of knockdown shooters and
experience point guard, and you know, I think they're they're They're definitely an
NCAA tournament team for sure, you know, in my mind, not even
close. They're really good. You talked about the schedule and how you wouldn't
change or you liked what you did in December, But how much of this
maybe it's just being back in the kale. Do you feel like it made
a difference. Well, yeah, I mean I ran our team through a
gauntlet, and I knew we were gonna I mean, I would have been
shocked if we would have got through it unscathed, you know, I mean,
obviously that's what we wanted to do, but it didn't happen. And
then, you know, you and then luck of the luck or unluck of
the draw, your first two conference games are on the road, and the
next thing, you know, you haven't played home in a month, and
you know, I'm just I think we maybe maybe we got a little bit
worn down physically, emotionally, you know, and it just it's it's hard
to trend up all the time. So you know, Stanford got our attention
and and and our guys responded, but you know, it don't mean a
lot if we don't respond again on Saturday, and there we go, right,
yeah, to go back to my question real quick. I thought my
question bollowed with Boswell was a fair question. It was simple to the point
because he had been struggling right, right, And I didn't ask you know,
you know Boswell had been struggling. I didn't even mention that. It's
just it was good to see him play, right, and boom, he
sounded defensive. He sounded not not overly but slightly like sure, like leave
him alone alone there. Here's one thing I want to ask you. So,
so he's eighteen years old, we go into that, I'm like crazy,
but he's also played a lot of games, right, and he's a
veteran now, right, at some point, at some point, Jay,
what do you sa say? He's no longer eighteen and he's a player now?
I think right now, I do totally agree he's got enough experience,
right, because it's not you know, he's got a full year in.
Remember he didn't he didn't start playing till until halfway through last year, right,
So he's got a full year in. So he's he's full on a
sophomore. Now, there's a lot of freshmen who play as true freshman and
you have you know, they they're they're able to do certain things. I
get it. He's young age wise, but he's not young as a player.
He played a luck this summer in in a brick time American So I
think I think that's going to be overplayed. I know when I write these
things now, I'm not going to mention it because it's not it's not mentioned.
Itvant exactly not really, it's not, but people will still mention it.
But the thing about the thing about Boswell is that one he doesn't look
eighteen. Sure, okay, look, and he doesn't play like. He
doesn't play like he's eighteen. He doesn't have, you know, the physical
his physical presence does not. He doesn't look like an eighteen year old.
He's got a full beard, and you know, and he's a he's a
stocky, physical kid. Sure you know, he looks like a veteran and
and and look he what what do we know? You know? Is he
gonna be in the NBA next year. So let me. You can't keep
playing the card, so let me look great, great point, So let
me let's play this card or or apples to apples that we can Crevis freshman.
I don't know how old he is, right, but what did he
say in this clip? He had to toughen up and blah blah blah.
But he doesn't say that about Boswell, and Boswell has experience never mentioned in
age and stuff. Is there a balance, Well, no, there's not.
A part of it is because Boswell is supposed to be or is in
a position to be the leader of this team. What the team doesn't matter,
right, it's his team because he's the point guard. He's you know,
he's got the time in even more so the Caleb Love who's got you
know, a couple of years you know under his belt, or you know
some of these other guys, you know, Palla Larson. But Boswell,
you know, he's got the ball in his hands. He's the he's the
I can't think of the right word, but you know, you just consider
him to be the leader of this team. And maybe and maybe Tommy is
trying to take some of that pressure for expectation off of him. That's no
question. Because he's eighteen years old, that's no question. But but that's
that's not an excuse. But if he was eighteen years old, okay,
and playing as a true freshman. So let's say let's say he you know
this was his first year, right, you wouldn't be saying, well,
he's only eighteen. You'd be saying he's a freshman. You might be saying
he's a freshman, but you'd be But if you've put him, if you've
put him in a position to be your starting point guard on the team that
you know was ranked number one in the country, you can't say he's kind
of young. We got to baby him a little bit. But I think
of what it sounds like he's doing. Yeah, and you can't do that
because he's already got a lot of experience. Right, he's one of the
team leaders, like you said, so all that's kind of like a double
I'm not sure what he's doing with it. He's protecting him. I know
what he's protecting him because I think that's what he thinks he needs to do.
He doesn't need to And I don't know if over the last couple of
weeks he's you know, heard the noise. He tells us he doesn't listen
to the noise, But how can you not sure right that he's heard.
You know, he's heard the criticisms of Boswell, whether it's been in the
national media or the local media or wherever that he's not been playing well.
You know he sees in front of him because he's affected sometime Tommy right,
Yeah, yeah, he's played poorly. I mean, that's just it.
And let me throw this into you because I saw this guy just mentioned.
They're making money. They're they're they're making now. They're kind of semi professionals,
so got to earn the paper, bingo, bingo. And we're not
trying to get on him, We're just laying down the circumstances. True.
Look, I think I think I like Colin Boswell a lot. I think
he's fantastic. I like him a lot. I think he's just what this
team needs. But like any other player, he's gonna have his ups and
downs. And Okayleb Love hasn't played great every game, Lumar Bello hasn't played
every game, Kela Larson hasn't pay every game, So why does he defend
Colin Boswell when he doesn't play well for a while? You know those guys,
I mean, look again, we you know, remember when we we
had that talk with with Evan macau about the importance of Larson again big game
last night. Yeah, and he was kind of invisible eighteen. Yeah he
played, He played really well. And you said he had eighteen yeah,
yeah, yeah, No, all these guys are the some of their parts.
Boswell specifically had a fantastic game that passed. He made. It was
fantastic. Uh. And guess what I've had about three weeks and stretch some
points. Yeah, maybe, you know, maybe Tommy was feeling a little
guilty about calling out his guards after the Stafford game. Hey, right,
we didn't do that, And yeah he did it, but he called him
all out, didn't. You know? He didn't go by one. All
right, we gotta take our break. We're gonna be back. We got
Jake, and Jake Fisher's gonna come in and probably gloat about his pick of
uh, you know, Arizona going eight or nine wins and they got ten,
so even he didn't think they were gonna get that. And then Eric
Rohades from the Barstool Sports Arisonta Bowl come in, David. They announce some
pretty big TV numbers. So we'll talk to you to Eric about things.
But Jake Fisher coming right up. So stick around. For more than twenty
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your free evaluation today. Steve Rivera and Jake and Salez they have their eye
on the Ball on Tucson's Sports Stage yet Fox Sports fourteen fifty streaming live.
I mean iheid radio WAPs. Hey, welcome back to Eye on the Ball
here Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. He's Jacob Zas. Now
on the phone, we have former U of A linebacker Jake Fisher, one
of our great sponsors. Jake, how are you? I'm going wonderful?
Can you guys hear me? Okay, we're doing well. You can hear,
we can hear you. Find Hey, how in the world did you
screw up and picking Arizona not to win enough games? I don't know.
I feel terrible. You know, I'm normally I'm the more optimistic one,
but apparently I was a little bit more pessimistic than you know this year.
So next year you'd all make up for and I'll go ahead and right now
say we're gonna win double digit games. Well, we'll joke, of course,
because you were the guy. And I said this yesterday to Jay.
You guys you had it pegged more than anybody that I know, winning eight
or nine I think it was uh for the season. And and they win
ten. Yeah, And there was a there was a handful of games that
we had to you know, split in my opinion, to get that eight
or nine wins, and apparently we just went ahead and said, you know,
screw it and win them all. Yeah, Jake, you know,
I asked Brian Jefferies this, and I'll tell you his answer after I hear
yours, you know again, being the Arizona fan that I've been for you
know, sixty years and watching teams, you know, do what they do,
it probably took me until after the Utah game. We're at the Utah
game that I thought, holy hell, this team is really good. They're
not just you know, finding a way to win. They're really good.
When did you think, I mean, watching their games, when did you
think this team is really well? I'll tell you after that Mississippi State game,
I thought, oh crap, we're going to kind of just be a
you know, kind of a middle middle road team or whatever. But I
looked at it as saying, if we just get rid of the five or
whatever turnovers it was, we should have gone on the road against an SEC
team and won. I think that I knew that we were real after the
Washington and sc games, just because obviously you see Washington's in the National Championship
game. And at the time, I think sc was a top five ish
team, you know, with the returning Hives and winner, and we went
to their place, went into triple ot and just one bring part away from
potentially you know, continuing that game. You know, I knew that we
were right there. We didn't look like we were that different talent wise,
and uh, you know, from there, it was just we got to
kind of get a couple of big wins under our belt. You start believing,
you start, you know, kind of knowing that you belong. And
I think that after that trouncing that we we gave Washington State, I knew
that we were good. But like I said, I thought that we had
to win one of those UCLA and Oregon State games for us to continue to
get to that eight or nine win season, and we won both. So
I think after we've destroyed Washington State, I think that's when I knew that
we were legit. See that that didn't even do it for me. I
thought Washington State just you know, crapped themselves, and I so I I
it honestly, I mean, you know, they then they beat Oregon State,
then they beat UCLA and they had that game against Colorado. I'm like
it just I just couldn't get myself to you know, get you know,
to jump on that and believe they're really this good. You been bit when
missed. Yeah, I mean too many times I've you know, I've gone
into believing that and they've got my face kicked in. So it was.
It was when they went up twenty one to nothing on Utah and I said,
okay, all right, these guys are just damn good. Well,
and then if we didn't lose that Mississippi State game early on in the year,
I think we lose that Colorado game. You know, I think we
had to kind of learn how to be in a close game. And you
know, fortunately for us, we learned how to win. We had a
obviously we have a switching quarterback. You have a lot of the guys,
uh you know that come back from the season in which we only won five
games. But I just think, you know, it takes a little while
for some of these guys who come from you know, losing one game and
then losing or winning one game winning five to learn how to put away some
of those pesky teams like a Colorado so I mean, it just all comes
with the territory and now it's on to the next chapter and now it's we
expect to win. Yeah, no question. Okay, So one are the
things that we've been asking since the since the game is over and the season's
over, how do you sustain it? Historically Arizona does really well, the
next year they just pooped the pants and can't keep it keep it going well.
To be honest, I've seen it a couple of times myself where you
lose a couple of really good recruiters on the staff and then you have people
transfer out and you know, you have a good eight to nine win season
and and the next season it's like the five or six win team. So
I think the way that they're gonna be able to sustain it is keeping their
players. You know, around eighteen and twenty two starters are coming back from
this past year, and we're gonna have a couple holes to plug. But
that's what the transfer portals for. I think if we can keep them best
majority of our staffs here, which you know, I see no reason why
people would be leaving. Obviously, you have a quarterback that's gonna be you
know, only going into a second year starting, and he's gonna have a
year or two left after that. So I mean we're built for the long
term, and I think the most important thing is continuing to develop these young
guys. We have four or five starters from offensive line coming back. Obviously
it hurts to lose, you know, Wiley and DJ Williams, but you
know, we have an awesome running back that should rush for over a thousand
yards coming back. You have a great you know, I mean, shoot,
we're gonna have a great receiver, might be the best receiver in college
football coming back. So as long as you can just plug a couple holes
with the transfer portal or you know, even from within a couple guys step
up and become big time players in their own right, we're built for the
long haul. So it's not a flash in the pan type thing. They
built it from the ground up. You know, they set a solid foundation
and they've done everything they said they were going to do. Yeah, you're
probably about what how old were you in nineteen ninety eight, like eight years
old? I was eight, Okay, so you probably don't remember this,
but you know I flashed back on the when we talk about this to the
ninety eighteen that you know, twelve and one, the twelve and one team
beat Nebraska. They can't, you know, they just you know, they
were top ten going into the next year and the whole bit decided to play
Penn State. But none going into going into that next season, you know,
all the you know, everybody was back, you know, and you
just thought this team can, should be able to do this again, and
it didn't. And going into the season, I was told by somebody you
know, close to the program and said, this team is missing a very
big piece and it was one guy, Calvin Ethan. They don't have a
Calviny fun a captain, a guy who's you know, a locker room guy
who's gonna that he's going to make a huge difference, and that it doesn't
have a leader. You know, is there one guy like that, you
know on this team that is not going to be here? You know?
Is it Jordan Morgan, is it Jacob Cowing? Is it Tanner McLaughlin that
can is gonna have can have that same kind of impact? Or was it
spread out enough that there's enough guys to make up for losing those guys?
And I'm gonna talk about the physical skills, you know, having a good
tight end or receiver. But I'm talking about the things that those guys brought
to the locker room is veteran players, you know what I think. I
think the quarterback is the biggest role to play in regards to the leadership.
You know. I know it doesn't seem like the raw raw type, but
he's that calming effect. You know, he's going to make a play.
You know, he's gonna set us up for you know, success. So
I think him coming back just a year older is going to be more than
enough. Uh, you know, losing a guy like Jordan Morgan. You
know, I don't know him personally. He doesn't seem like a raw rock
guy either. He seems like the guy that just went out and, you
know, beat the hell out of you and went to the next play and
beat the hell out of you again. Right. So, I mean there
are some guys you got to remember. These guys are gonna leave an impression
on these guys too. And you can tell there's not any kind of locker
room deal because there's not a mass exodus of people wanting to leave, you
know. I mean, and think about the coaches too, like think about
the atmosphere in the program where you have you know, Noah and t Max,
who reportedly both got offered over a million dollars to leave and they said
no. So, you know, I think just the atmosphere, what the
coaches have done, having the quarterback coming back, with the comments, the
fact that I think everything's gonna be fun and and I don't think they're gonna
have any you know, problems reeling off double digit wins again because you're not
going to be in a conference that's got Oregon, SC Washington, but now
in the Big twelve, you're not even going to have Texas or Oklahoma,
So you're not going to have that one or two team you know on the
schedule where you look at and you're like, ah, damn, that's an
l I'm not too sure if I believe that million dollars purchase for both for
each of them. How you really don't believe? You you do? Why
do you believe that? Oh? Because I either message boards on other different
uh you know, uh, colleges that have that kind of money that you
know basically uh, you know, like going to Nebraska, the damn quarterback
going over there signed for like a few millions so and he hasn't played a
snap. So imagine having a guy at a quarterback position and having a potential
first round draft pick that is his best friend. You're probably willing to throw
a little bit more money at them because they're a package deal. How much
time in the day do you have to be listening to that gossip? I
stay up late, I have work, and then I get all the other
fun stuff out of the way later. We got to do I show it
midnight one. Well, that's what we'll play. Jay. Uh, did
what did you like the most about this team? Uh? You know,
on the field, off the field or whatever. What what What put a
smile on your face when you thought about this team? Uh, to be
honest with you, it's putting a whooping on Utah and then just completely dismantling
as U in back to back weeks and then proving that we belong even though
we didn't have our best game against Oklahoma in the Alimable kind of getting back
at the other Oklahoma school that beat the hell out of my team in the
Alimable that that stretch of games was awesome. Yeah, No, this was
a This was a fun, unexpected year for everybody, I think, don't
you think it was not unsuspected for me? Guys already, I thought they
were going to be good. I just thought that, you know, because
you were going to go through five or six straight top twenty five teams,
that we would drop a couple of them. And we didn't. So you
know, I'm the one that I thought we were going to be decent,
But I didn't think we were gonna be in an Alamo Bowl and dismantle,
uh not really dismantled. We didn't play that great, but you still handedly
beat you know, an Oklahoma team because your defense decided to show up.
So except wait, okay, for millions, it was fun for Jake,
well, he knew, are you were ready? I was ready. I
was ready to It wasn't everyone said, we just got to get to a
bowl game. I thought we were going to exceed that pretty pretty well,
and we did. We'll give you that, Jake, because you did and
you were and you stood by it too, because I know that that after
the Stanford game, even even though they won the game, and I did
think normally, you know, an Arizona team loses that game when they played
the way they did and the way you know, Fafita came in and won
the game. I didn't feel great about about the about this team, and
I was a little scared of Washington coming into town the next week. But
then when they played the way they played against Washington, and then I mean
thought they should have beat us. See that, Okay, you know you
felt a whole lot better, but you still didn't expect this stretch games that
that that they ended up with. But you know, I didn't see this
coming. I didn't. I certainly didn't see ten wins coming, and I
admitted that. You know, when Steve and I made the bet on over
under five wins, you know I had I really did have trouble finding six
wins. I thought, I thought they had five good ones, but they
were gonna have to win some that you didn't expect them to win. And
then they won a whole bunch, and what really annoyed what really annoys me.
And I know you have to give the nod to the older guy who
was the returning starter who did nothing to lose his job during camp. But
if we have Noah the entire season, I don't think that it's I think
that we handedly beat SC I know that we'd beat Mississippi State. So it's
like, damn, we might only be like a one lost season and we're
probably in a New Year six Bowl or you know, even better, you
know, because the only team that I said, you know after the game,
yeah they're better was Washington and it was Noah's first start. Right,
Yeah, no, let's go quickly. We only have a couple of minutes.
Your thoughts on the basketball team. Review the last two games. You
have one team that doug did what it did and now you have another one
who did something last night. So yeah, so my whole thing on the
basketball team, they're going to be fine this year. Going basically to Purdue
even though it was at you know, in Indianapolis and losing and we almost
came back and we made a couple of bonehead and mistakes and they pulled away
in the last few seconds. Obviously losing to I forget the Florida team anyways,
losing too that team fau that there's nothing wrong with that. They had
a guy that had the game of their life and may he couldn't miss down
the stretch. And then you know the Stanford one. Obviously, I don't
know what it is about the last few years, but we always have a
random game that we go on the road and we just let them shoot the
lights down. It's kind of a wake up call. So you know,
I still think we're going to win the pack. I still think we're going
to get a number one seat as long as we keep our you know,
crap together and we don't have any injuries. Yeah. No, I totally
agree with you, because it always does happen. He's right. There's a
game or two in there where you have clunkers and you just shake your hand.
Normally it's at Colorado, but Colorado is going to be decent this year,
so that might be an l But I don't see anyone beating us at
all for the rest of the time unless we show up and just you know,
have a bad game. Yeah, okay, Jake, thanks a bunch
of how's business? Tell us about the business. Business is going well,
guys, Arizona Health Insider. We have plans of zero OUTPATI deductible, zero
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Arizona help insider dot com. Plus he gets to work with a fellow wildcat.
So give us a call. Thanks Jake. All right, guys,
thank you Jakes. Jake's forty seex footy. Oh he did he did?
You? I mean, come on, he was the only dude that I
know that knew that. Yeah, I mean, you know, yeah,
and he's optimistic obviously internally, Yeah, but he was a little bit beyond
that too. But plus also, you know, he's got more knowledge than
most right, he played and you know, yeah, he has a better
sense than than your IDs. Yeah, they're good on him. All right,
let's take our break. We're going to come back. We'll take your
calls five two zero four one six seventy four to forty Give us your thoughts
on on the game last night. Were you surprised at how they came out?
Did you expect him to come out like that? What'd you think?
Give us a call five to zero four one six seventy four four If you're
an Arizona Man's basketball fan. You know it's been successful for nearly forty years.
Now take a look back at the Ludolsen era. In my new book,
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today at a Teamsecurity dot net, Extreamy Live, I Mean iHeartRadio aff This
is I on the Ball with Steve Brivera and Jay Gatzalez on Fox Sports fourteen
fifteen. Hey, welcome back to my in the Balcao, Fox Sports fourteen
fifty. I'm Steve, He's Jake. You have about fourteen minutes or so
left in the hour if you want to call us five two oh four one,
six seventy four forty, that'd be great. Give us a quick call.
End of the week. We've had some good calls this week. We
had some from Nico. Yeah, Nicos shock, you're still shocked. Welcome
to the new year. The world is ending soon. You make me laugh,
you make me cough. Well, Nico's getting married, you know,
the world is something's gone on something, You're right. Yeah, So a
good night tonight, another good big game tomorrow right six o'clock the women play
today game tonight made the women have a Colorado coming in Colorado. This Colorado
team is also ranked I think they're like fifth or something like that. Isn't
that the return of a player? And it's what's her name? She's none
of what's her name? She's pretty dark, I think of her name.
But they beat this is the team that beat you l s u right right
right away out of the gate. Yeah, they're coming in ranked fifth in
the country, but you know they're still not the top ranked team from the
Pac twelve you got you got UCLA at two, Colorado at five, Stanford
and eight us He at nine, Utah at fifteen. Then, I mean,
this is a tough league. That's a gunlet. Like he said last
night, you know, he talked about that being a gunlet that he put
them through. But I think it's for the best. Yeah, you go
ten thirteen, ten and three, No. Eleven and three from a tough
schedule when you didn't have a clue how good you were going to be coming
in this year, right, right, So I think you're gonna take ten
and three, eleven and three. Yeah, maybe not the circumstances, but
I think you'll take it undred percent. You know, Arizona women, they're
nine and four coming off of they beat the hell out of a Seattle team
the other night, but had a couple of tough losses. You know,
lost to a ranked at Texas team, so and they lost up at up
in the Footprints Center against Gonzago, another ranked team. So you know,
not a terrible record. Uh. You know again, you know, we've
talked about what the expectations are dating back to when they went to the final
four, you know, got to the championship game. People still have that
expectation. But nine and four is respectable, right, and especially now you're
going into this league. It's just look, Colorado is coming in at five
and Utah's coming in at twelve. I mean, this is or at fifteen.
This is hard. Yeah, this is a hard weekend. You know,
far Zona wins either game, you got to give them some prompts for
that. Yeah, of course, of course both are going to be very
tough, even at home in front of a crowd maybe about seven thousand.
You think, yeah, I think, I think they'll show up. It's
a it's a it's a six o'clock game tonight. Last that crowd was pretty
good. I thought they were pretty It was decent. It was pretty I
thought they were vocal. They were with the students gone too. Yeah.
Yeah, and that section you know, regular people, you know, those
tickets go, you know, get gets sold to the public, and you
know, there's probably some tickets for Saturday because those tickets are not part of
the take your packet. So if you haven't been to a game Tuesday,
Saturday is a good good time to look up and say, you know,
because it wasn't a full house and all the attendance wasn't it wasn't a sellout,
but still it was late. It started late to Bill Walton back in
the house, just a character, obviously, I've spent him out of a
thousand times. And I go up to him last night and says, he
says, yeah, I know who you are. And then he doesn't remember
my name, which is fine, but you know, it says, oh,
the book, your book. Luke wrote the front to the he wrote
the forward for it, says, yeah, have you ready yet? No,
I'm too busy. We got to get him on the show. Yeah,
we do get him back here. But you know, I well I
I saw him in the restroom, but I didn't go up and try to
shake his hand. How you do We just don't. Yeah, that's a
that's a that's a man car. You don't try to take anybody's hand,
either in the bathroom or coming out in the bathroom. Yeah, I just
kind of said hi, But everybody does you know? Everybody know? Sure?
But the Utah game tomorrow, Arizona game, men's game is it's is
it six o'clock? With the early evening, gaming'll go grab some dinner,
go to the game, get home relatively early. Uh. And you know
again, since the student tickets are are not those student tickets are available to
the public. If you haven't been to a game or want to get to
a game, this is this is when you should try and get to because
the students get their tickets back for the weekend of the seventeenth and the twentieth
when usc UCLA comes dead right. Okay, a lot of things going on
obviously in high schools to coaches moving, going, leaving. We'll get that
settled down when it gets more settling. Yeah. You Jeff Skurn is retired
again. Your guy that said he was leaving in one place, he's now
with Yeah, Pueblo coach left now as it saw Rita, So yeah,
we've had him on the show. The defensive coordinator at South Point got promoted
to the head coaching position. So there's just been some movement among among the
coaches in Tucson. We'll get we'll get Hobvier onto you at some point to
kind of explain it all to us. Yeah, and then on Monday,
so let people on Monday, we're gonna spend some time previewing the National Championship
game. Justin Spears, who's got his own radio show in the mornings on
ESPN Radio. He's gonna come in studio. We haven't had any studio guests
in a long time. Yeah, it's been a while. He's gonna come
in studio at three point fifteen on Monday. He just wants to spy our
procession. Yeah, he's gonna come into our studios. Says that, guys,
you need to do better. They got a nice studio. I know
they did in there. Yeah, they've got a nice studio. Or like
my son when he walked in for the first time, he said, this
is it not what I expected? Of course, dude, we're too you
know we got we're feeling to the oscar. Yeah, we're just the potato
chip bags all over the pla like a Waterburger cup, coffee cup, co
some throat laws and wrappers. In fact, I was thinking about we got
to get a podcast, you know, video video to post, and I'm
thinking I don't know what to clean the room. But then we got a
shave and stuff. Oh no, I didn't do it. Never. We're
better off just being on the radio. But Justin will be honest, We'll
He'll be on for a couple of seconds, so I'll give plenty of time
to you know, recap his thoughts on the season. And then again as
we've been with everybody else, what next, Yeah, and then at at
four fifteen, Jack McGruder sports bettingdime dot com or oh buddy, he's been.
He's been covering the the college football playoff for Sports Betting Dime. I
had to call him yesterday talking about, you know, different odds and stuff
like that. Did he make his pick? Public? He did not make
a pick, but we're gonna make him. He's better off. We're gonna
make make a pick. But he is going to come and gloat along with
me about Washington and Michael Pennix that we both thought that that that that that
that guy and that team was really I saw something yesterday, I don't know
if I saw on my MSN website or whatever, saying that the Pennix was
probably the most underrated or what overlooked or whatever. I can't remember the word
runner up ever last right decades because no one really knew who he was or
whatever reason. Steve Joe Burrow was undefeated at l s U you know,
hands down national team, hands down the Heisman Trophy win. You put this
Washington team, call them l s U with Michael Penick and Michael pennixs is
your hemand Trophy win? Why they gave it to Jadie Daniels And it wasn't
close. It wasn't a close close. Yeah, it's the numbers thing.
It's it's stupid. It's got setting me off again totally, but it's stupid.
I never won. You. If you if you lifted Washington and put
them east of the Mississippi, He's winning the Heisman Trophy. Yeah, no
question, no question. We'll talk more about that Monday, but I totally
agree with you. My hope is my hope is that you know, with
Arizona going into the Pac twelve now because I mean the Big twelve, that
that that bias tends to go away because more of their game, not all
of their yeah, more of their games are going to get in front of
national media that should see these guys. And I'm not saying no Offafied or
McMillan should be winning the Heisman trumph. But what I'm saying is that these
teams, you know, the Washington and Oregon in the USC. You know,
it's been hard for these guys to get that national recognition. I mean,
you know, when you think back to Toby Gerhardt and and Christian McCaffrey
and Andrew Luck, one of those guys should have won a Heisman. I
know Matt Lioner won a Heisman. I know, I know Reggie Bush,
but they were at us C. You always pay attention to USC. It's
the Oregons, the Washington's, the u c l as, you know that
don't get the attention that these that say a us C CA you know,
I mean, Marcus Mariota won it, but he should have been a unanimous
pick. You know, the guy was by far the best playing in college
football that year. And it's you know, just because of where they are,
they don't get that. I think the move does help them with that.
It'll be more eyes moriyes and the price or whatever you want to say,
because the West Coast is going to be less visible now for sure.
I mean I think back to the first time I voted for the Heisman years
ago, right in the eighties, and Barry Sanders won that won the trophy,
Yeah at Oklahoma State. Yeah, you know, eighty twish but eighty
Barry Sanders. Yeah, who's the who's the guy Barry Sanders? Who's god?
I'm thinking of? Who am I thinking of? Olahoma State? Oh?
What won the Heisman? And he beat out and he beat out Rodney
Pete? Right, you know Rodney Pete? Who you know? Usc that
year was in the running for the national championship, but he was on the
West coast. He didn't have a chance. I'm going back to who am
I thinking? Because I remember this very well in ANTEENA Marcus Allen, No,
no, it was I thought it was. I thought it was Barry
Sanders. Who else was there back in Oklahoma? Oklahoma State and in those
groups? Oh? Oh, oh oh, who did you say? You
know what I'm talking. I know I know who you're talking about. I
know you're talking. We got a call, Quie, I'll look, I'll
look it up. All right, let's take why am I You're on?
Then one on the ball. Hey, guys, how's it going? Happy
New Year? This is done? Hey, don how are you? Oh?
I'm doing okay, I was I'm doing really good after that Ala mobile
and everything. But the reason I'm calling today is Jay. Yeah, with
the Michael Panics. You you you act like you can't you don't know how
to spell ESPN. That's that's that is the that is the reason why there's
an East Coast bias. And the other thing is is when it goes on
when you look at history, who was the last West Coast quarterback that had
a decent NFL career? Okay? Now, now, Andrew luck didn't get
to finish. Is so we wrote, we really don't know, but he
was on the road to having a good career. But before him, who
was it? Now I hear you, I mean I told you it's Carson
Palmer. Carson Palmer. And after that, there hasn't been a single West
Coast quarterback that had a career in the NFL. And I don't and I
don't think Panics is going to have one either. But you but to your
point, to your point, I agree with you on his stats and everything
else. But go ahead, let me throw this out at you, donau
because we're trying to figure out this player that that that Steve was trying to
think of. But Bill, here here's a rundown of quarterbacks and you know
from that that have won the Heisman. Almost none of them had great careers.
You know, you can argue Doug Flutie had the best, Vinny Testaverdi
andre Ware, Charlie Ward, Danny Wirfel, these guys are all won the
Heisman Trophy, so it shouldn't you know how they did in the pros.
Sam Bradford won, you know, won the damn Heisman Trophy, and that
guy was a bust in the in the NFL. So I'm just my point
being that Michael Pennix was a great quarterback on a great team, and instead
of giving him the Heisman Trophy, they gave it to a guy who piled
up stats on a crappy team that they and then didn't even show up for
his bull game. I mean, it just bothers me. And he continues
to bother me. Oh no, I know, I know it bothers you.
I just I fill on trust Washington. I just don't. Yeah,
I understand. I mean I understand, you know, because they beat Arizona
by six, and I don't know if it's was Arizona that good or was
Washington that bad. You know, you come from the program, and I'm
gonna probably say this wrong. I don't want to join a join a club
that allows me to be in it? Is that what it is? You
know, I don't want to be a you know what I'm saying. There's
that sprain. No, but I've said it before. The agains over the
last several years have been West Coast good, right, yeah, right,
you know they haven't been good good yeah. Yeah. And if Washington wins
on Monday, well then they're great good. I'm gonna have to I'm gonna
have to eat that. But until I see it, I'm not gonna believe
it. Yeah, No, I get it, all right, don We
got to hit the road. We got We're here at the top of the
hour. So appreciate the call as always, Thank you, Thank our guys.
Yeah. So the guy I'm thinking about, Billy Billy Sims, he
wanted in seventy eight, seventy eight, I was thinking eighty two, eighty
eight, Berry Sander. It was Billy Simms. Uh, George Rogers in
eighty, Marcus all In eighty one, herschel Walker eighty two, Mike Rogier
eighty three. Okay, Billy Simms in the late eighties, he wanted in
seventy eight. No, no, no, no, I'm talking about Barry
Center. Nineteen eighty eight. God, I'm nineteen eighty eight. I've last
six years somewhere. Yeah, all right, Hey, we're gonna take our
break. We'll be back breaking news coming up. I think I've got some,
so we'll see how it goes. Stick around