About 36 hours removed from a season-opening win over Hawaii, Brent Brennan returned to the podium to begin discussing the week ahead and preparation for upcoming opponent Weber State.
But while internally attention has been turned to those Wildcats, most of the questions he received were understandably about his own ones. That included plenty of queries about the performance, which graded well but still included some disappointing moments.
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“We’re understanding, we’re not there yet,” Brennan said. “We’re getting there, it’s starting to show up, but it’s not what our standard for red line is yet. It’s starting to show up, and I’m excited about that.”
Arizona scored 40 points and averaged more than six yards per play but struggled on third down and had several offensive penalties. Brennan chalked some of that up to first-game jitters.”
“There were fans in the stands, the band was playing, the cheerleaders were there, rocking and rolling in Arizona Stadium,” he said. “It’s the first time they’ve felt real pressure. It’s the first time on third down, if we didn’t get the first down, we had to come off the field. In practice, we’re like whistle, run it again. There’s no running it again on game day, so we have to dial up the level of execution if we want to be the offensive football team we want to be.”
Here’s what else Brennan said at his presser to open Week 2 of the 2025 season:
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On the inconsistent passing attack: “I think the simplest answer to that that we need to just throw it to the right guy. I think there’s some of that, call it first game, kind of where Noah was scanning a little bit too much. He just needs to go directly where the ball supposed to go. He’s such a great leader and so accountable,and he’s so willing to admit, like, yeah, I jumped that progression and I went to this other and I should have just fitted the ball right there. I’m excited about the ownership he takes. I’m excited about his relationship with Coach Doege, and just what those conversations are like, and how dynamic those conversations are, because I just think they’re really helpful.
“I think also the fact that three of our starting skill players were out. We had a couple freshmen running out there.”
On going 3 for 11 on 3rd down: “There has to just be more consistency with play and execution on that.”
On the receivers getting called for multiple holding penalties: “I don’t like penalties, but I love it when receivers block, I’ll tell you that. When you think about historically, how receivers are elite, or how people think about them, they’re always kind of thrown into the prima donna, the selfish category, whatever that is. To me, the best way they can show us that they’re not is to block their tails off. I think a couple of those times they were locked up with somebody down the field, and the defender kind of got outside the framework, and they just didn’t let them go. I was encouraged by the effort.”
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On freshman Isaiah Mizell logging the most snaps of any receiver: “That was the result of circumstances, that was the result of of Chris Hunter being out for a little bit of that game. But I thought he handled it well, and that’s the reason we recruited guys like Isaiah Mizell, it’s so they can come in and play and make an impact. That’s a big thing for me. If we tell a freshman, like we recruit a freshman, and then he gets here and he’s in the mix. If he’s going to play, he’s going to play, like he’s in the game. We’re not going to give him two reps a game and ruin his freshman year, right? Like he’s in the game. So now the onus is on the freshman to know what to do, to live red line, and then make plays when he gets an opportunity. And I think that was part of the fun part of seeing Mizell kind of settle down. And you saw that play late in third quarter where he caught that curl and got out on the long third down and gave us a chance to go for it on fourth.”
On if Hunter was held out after six snaps because of the opponent: “No way, I’m not doing that. If they can play and help us win I don’t care who we’re playing, they’re in the game.”
On what he liked and disliked about the offensive line: “I liked how we ran the football. I thought we were physical in the run game with our front, with the offensive line. I thought that was really exciting. What do we need to work on? I think people got to Noah too many times. And I think that’s easy to see on the tape.”
On keeping Fifita and the starting offensive line in midway through the 4th quarter: “We’re still playing football. I think it’s your first game and you’re trying to get everybody to settle in, you’re trying to give us a chance to maximize the reps in game, the live bullets that they get. There wasn’t any thought at that time to swap.”
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On offensive coordinator Seth Doege calling plays from the booth: “I think, for most of my career he’s been up on offense. That’s where I’m more comfortable, especially with the offensive play caller. He was great. I think he feels like he sees it a lot better from up there, which I think most offensive coaches do. And the communication was very, very healthy with the offensive assistant coaches on the sideline.”
On examples of ‘red line’ effort: “On the long run by Quincy (Craig), a long touchdown run. Go back and watch it and watch Ty Buchanan. Watch this 300-pound dude. I was giving Quincy a hard time, I’m like, hey, man, Ty almost caught you on your long touchdown run. And also, Tristan Bounds was close, too. Those guys getting to the football, those guys showing up around the football. Doesn’t matter if it’s offense or defense, it’s just having as much population on the football as we can. And I think that when that happens, good things happen to your football team, and I think it’s contagious.
“There’s a play where we have a we have a tackle for loss or a sack, it’s in the north end zone, north side of the stadium, on the right side of the field, and you see Julian Savaiinaea, it was great, because he’s busting his tail to get over there, and the whistle is not blowing, but he leaves his feet as the whistle is blown, and then he kind of like somersaults past the pile. And so he didn’t have the penalty, but he was there. And if anything, if that thing got out or if that thing didn’t get finished, he was going to be there to clean it. And that was really exciting to me. So those are the two plays that really jump out in my mind from the game.”
On being able to tackle effectively without practicing it: “I think there’s a reason the National Football League doesn’t tackle in practice. They never, ever tackle in practice. Because those players are super high value parts of their program. It’s hard to replace a really good player. You’re not getting, Micah Parsons is not coming off the waiver wire. Especially now, college football is a little like that. High value players, hard to replace. We don’t have a waiver wire. We don’t have free agents, so we have what we have. It’s here, once we start training camp. Now, the flip side of that is that college football players are not NFL football players yet. And so the tackling, and I do believe, like outside of hitting a baseball, tackling a person in space is the hardest thing to do in sport. And so not getting the opportunity to do that live, you are taking a chance, but then you’re also taking a chance when you have your best players in a live situation and they get taken out by collateral damage. I think we do as much as we can, try and prepare them to tackle well, I think our defensive scout does a great job with that.”
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On what contributed to some punts nearly getting blocked: “One was protection, and then one was not doing what you’re supposed to do, sometimes that happens. We’re trying to eliminate those moments. So it was good yesterday. We got to see it on film. The players got to see it, and we got to coach them up. And I’m excited that we’ll make some changes. We’ll make the adjustments necessary, and we’ll get it right.”
On where the defense can improve: “I think the biggest thing for us is just we I think we lost the edge a couple times, and I think that’s something that we can’t do, especially with quarterback that can move a little bit, which this guy can from Weber. You have to keep him contained. You saw the guy the other night have some success once he got outside of us, so we gotta fix that.”
