Taking a Deep Dive Into 2024 Wildcats Football

The expectations for Arizona football coming into the 2024 season were high. The team started the year ranked No. 21 in the Preseason AP Poll with a good number of returning players and stars Noah Fifita and Tetairoa McMillan leading the way.

But, things didn’t go that way for Arizona and new head coach Brent Brennan as the team struggled on both sides of the ball and couldn’t get any consistent play going throughout the year.

The Wildcats finished 4-8 on the year and ended the season on a two-game losing streak and lost seven of the last eight games.

However, although the season went the wrong way for Arizona, how close was it to being a more successful year? And is the program as far off as people think?

Well, I’m here to tell you that the program isn’t far from being a competitive team as some believe and that last year could’ve gone differently if it wasn’t for variables outside the coaching staff's hands.

First, Brennan and his staff started behind the eight ball from the moment they stepped foot on campus.

See, most coaches around January already know (for the most part) what the majority of their roster will look like for spring football and are adding finishing touches leading up to camp.

That wasn’t the case for Brennan. The staff and him had to re-recruit the whole football roster and worry about players leaving to different programs during a 30-day window of when Jedd Fisch left for Washington.

“I felt like we spent the first six months on the job kissing everyone's ***, asking them to stay,” Brennan said at Big 12 Media Day. “It was just a horrible foundation for what we're trying to get done there.”

So, Arizona was behind the eight ball in terms of setting a foundation early on.

Then, as the season approached, the team was missing offensive tackle and former four-star recruit Raymond Pulido, who despite injuries played in six games the previous season and was thought to be the left tackle on the starting line.

But, that never happened as Brennan announced that he was no longer playing football, due to unknown reasons.

That set the team behind at left tackle, which many consider one of the most important positions on the football team.

But, the blows didn’t stop there for Arizona.

After the first game of the year where the Wildcats dominated New Mexico 61-39 with the offense rolling, the team received a massive hit to the roster. 

That was the unknown status of starting running back Jacory Croskey-Merritt, who against the Lobos rushed 106 yards on 13 carries and scored a touchdown.

After the game, the following week the Wildcats and Brennan received the news that the NCAA would be looking into Croskey-Merritt’s eligibility, thus causing the team to make him sit out until further notice.

Well, that process took an extremely long time and by week seven, or eight, Brennan was still receiving questions if the star back was going to play again.

Croskey-Merritt never played again for the Wildcats and that took away a do-it-all every down back that the team desperately needed.

The offense never really got back on track due to several issues but the loss of Croskey-Merritt played a major role.

There were a lot of blow out losses but there were still winnable games for Arizona where the team just came up short.

The two that come to mind are the 28-22 loss to Texas Tech and the 31-26 loss to West Virginia. Heck, there could be a conversation of the 41-19 loss to BYU going a different way given that everything really fell apart in the fourth quarter.

 If the loss of Pulido and Croskey-Merritt didn't happen, Arizona would’ve been a bowl team last season and maybe would’ve won that game.

Now, you can’t change the past.

However, the point is, Arizona football, despite the issues of last season, isn’t as far off from being a competitive program like some people think.

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