In a game that featured over 440 passing yards from quarterback Nick Foles along with 101 yards on the ground from Arizona, it’s tough not to expect a Wildcats victory.

But Oregon State and sophomore quarterback Ryan Katz shredded Arizona’s secondary and held off Foles and company on its way to a 29-27 victory at Arizona Stadium.

“”They wanted to throw it and they threw it pretty much it will,”” said head coach Mike Stoops after the game. “”That’s disappointing to me that we didn’t cover better than we did tonight.””

The Beavers, who were fresh off of a 31-28 victory over ASU, struck first when senior receiver James Rodgers beat cornerback Trevin Wade on a double move and hauled in a 33-yard touchdown from Katz less than four minutes into the game.

From that point on Wade and the Arizona secondary couldn’t stop anybody, especially Rodgers who caught seven balls for 102 yards before leaving the game with a knee injury with 5:07 left in the second quarter.

Stoops said the secondary looked senseless and wasn’t playing smart and Katz took advantage.

In only his fifth career start the sophomore put on a show as tore apart the Wildcats defense to the tune of 393 yards, two touchdowns to go along with a rushing touchdown.

“”I thought he played an exceptional game in managing and not forcing the ball,”” Stoops said of Katz. “”I think he had one bad throw where he threw an interception, but besides that I thought the quarterback just beat us in a lot of different ways.””

Despite Arizona’s porous defensive showing, Foles and the offense still had a chance to remain undefeated and pull out a victory. But it was missed opportunities that killed Arizona.

Quarterback Nick Foles threw an interception in the endzone as Arizona was driving on Oregon State’s 21-yard line. Kicker Alex Zendejas also missed a 37-yard field goal at the end of the half that would have made it 17-10, but instead the Wildcats trailed by 10 at half. Zendejas also missed an extra point early in the third quarter.

“”We missed some opportunities to score and that ultimately cost us,”” Stoops said.

After a 33-yard touchdown run from Keola Antolin and a 41-yard catch and run by Nic Grigsby in the third quarter, Arizona only trailed by three. Receiver Juron Criner, who caught a 45-yard touchdown in the first quarter and finished with 12 catches for 19 yards, was tearing apart the Beavers’ defense.

But as they had all game, OSU’s offense controlled the clock – it won the time of possession battle by nearly 13 minutes – and rode a 1-yard touchdown run by Jacquizz Rodgers with 5:46 left that made it 29-20 to victory lane.

Antolin hauled in a 12-yard pass from Foles with 1:52 left to cut it to two, but Arizona couldn’t recover its onside kick and couldn’t mount a comeback.

“”It’s just kind of frustrating coming off of a bye week we should have been a lot more on top of things,”” said defensive end Ricky Elmore. “”I don’t know if we were just sluggish from the week off, but I don’t know but something needs to change.