Coming off a win to break their 20-game losing streak, the Arizona football team fell short against the University of Utah 38-29 on Saturday. Here are a few key stats from the loss.
7-of-15 on third down for Arizona:
It was a very efficient day for the Wildcats offense on third-downs, completing nearly 50% of their third-downs during the game. It is extremely important for this offense to keep the third downs to manageable conversions, and they were able to do that more often than not against the Utes.
174 yards rushing for Utah:
The common theme for the Wildcats all season defensively has been stopping the run and that was no different against a physical Utah offense. Despite their starting running back in Tavion Thomas not playing, they were coming off a game against Stanford where three different running backs ran for over 100 yards, so you knew they would still be tough against the run. That turned to be just the case as TJ Pledger rushed for 119 yards and two touchdowns on 25 carries.
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Zero turnovers and five penalties for Arizona:
It was a nice clean game for the Wildcats overall, not committing any turnovers to go along with just five penalties. Utah did not commit any turnovers either, but did commit eight penalties. Arizona is going to be in just about any game when they don’t turn over the ball.
One touchdown on four trips to the red zone for Arizona:
The story of this game can be summed up to this one stat. The Wildcats scored a touchdown just one time in the red zone on four trips compared to Utah scoring five touchdowns on six trips. In the three other trips for the Wildcats, they were stuffed up the middle on fourth-and-one on one drive, while being held to a field goal on two other drives. It was pretty evident they would have to score a lot of points to be able to beat the Utes, so leaving three trips to the red zone with just six points definitely did not help Arizona.
The Wildcats will now head out to Pullman to take on the Washington State Cougars on Friday night.
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