UW football visits Arizona team on the upswing

TUCSON, Ariz. — The Huskies headed out of the rain Friday and into the desert, to not only dry off, but in the expectations of most, get aired out.

The Huskies' opponent for today's 4:30 p.m. game, the Arizona Wildcats, are second in the Pac-10 in passing (274.5 yards per game), first in passing touchdowns (11) and feature the leading receiver in the conference (Mike Thomas, averaging 104.2 yards per game).

It figures to be a difficult challenge for the struggling UW defense, which is ranked 118th (of 119 teams) in the nation.

These are teams headed in different directions. Each entered the season with coaches perceived to be in make-or-break situations. The Huskies are 0-4, putting coach Tyrone Willingham at the very edge of the cliff, but Arizona is 3-1 and possibly en route to Mike Stoops' first winning season since he took over in 2004.

A loss today would put the Huskies at 0-5 for the first time since 1969, and a blowout might lead to even more speculation whether Willingham, 11-29 at UW, will last the season. Scott Woodward, the UW athletic director, said Monday that he doesn't foresee making an in-season coaching change, but he didn't rule it out.

Rumblings from Montlake this week indicated that practices have been particularly tension-filled, with coaches and players each feeling the frustration of a season bordering on the worst-case scenario.

Willingham, asked about the mood of the team on Thursday, said: "It's a football game. They are getting ready to play."

Oddsmakers have made the Wildcats 22 ½-point favorites, with money continuing to come in on Arizona all week.

Those looking for a good omen for the Huskies, however, might consider this — UW has as many Pac-10 wins at Arizona Stadium under Willingham as it does at Husky Stadium.

Washington is 2-0 at Arizona Stadium under Willingham, and it's 2-12 in Pac-10 games at home under Willingham (wins over UCLA in 2006 and California in 2007). Willingham is 6-22 in Pac-10 games overall at UW, also winning at WSU in 2006 and at Stanford in 2007.

In fact, the high-water mark of the Willingham regime might have come right here in 2006 when the Huskies beat Arizona 21-10 to improve to 4-1. At that point, UW had won five of seven games, including another win in Tucson late in the 2005 season (a 38-14 victory keyed by the Isaiah Stanback-to-Craig Chambers Hail Mary on the last play of the first half).

Stanback was injured against Oregon State two weeks later, and the Huskies are 5-19 since their last visit to Tucson.

Arizona was favored to win both of those games in Tucson. That they lost both has been somewhat emblematic of the Stoops era, which has featured at least one win over a Top 10 team each of the past three years, too often followed by a setback defeat to an underdog.

The Wildcats seemed to fall victim to that trend again three weeks ago, losing at New Mexico, 36-28.

Despite that defeat, Arizona junior right tackle Adam Grant, a graduate of Puyallup High, said he thinks this team is different from teams the past few years and shouldn't be as prone to such setbacks.

"Something I feel like we've never really had since I've been here until this year is that we are all willing to fight for each other to win every game we can," he said.

Today's game will reveal how much fight is left in the Huskies. Players who spoke with reporters mostly kept a stiff upper lip, insisting they still have faith.

"The [Stanford loss] hit us in our heart a little bit, but we haven't lost track of what we still can achieve," said defensive end Darrion Jones. "We all know what's out there [about Willingham's future], but we try to block that out and play football and not focus on the outside."

The spotlight for UW will fall on redshirt freshman QB Ronnie Fouch, making his first career start in place of injured Jake Locker. Fouch is more of a dropback-style QB, and UW's offense figures to feature more passing, and maybe more straight-ahead running. With walk-on Taylor Bean serving as the backup, the Huskies will try to keep Fouch out of harm's way as much as possible.

Defensively, the Huskies have proven vulnerable everywhere, allowing 507 yards per game and 7.5 yards per play.

The situation tonight seems dire, but junior defensive end Daniel Te'o-Nesheim promised this week that no one has given up.

"If they are, they aren't saying it," he said. "We are going to play eight more games, no matter what anybody thinks. So we are going to fight our butts off."

Bob Condotta: 206-515-5699 or bcondotta@seattletimes.com