By all rights and accounts, Arizona’s season should be over. The math looks more like quantum physics than long division.
Six losses before the middle of November.
Five consecutive losses across the middle of the season.
Zero margin for error during the stretch run.
Too many injuries to count, too many mistakes to correct and too many ghastly performances to comprehend.
And yet, the Wildcats are alive in the postseason chase after conjuring their best performance of the season just when the forecast looked darkest.
Their 27-3 victory over Houston on Saturday was filled with the elements missing from so many previous performances:
— The quarterback play was efficient as Noah Fifita found his rhythm after halftime and directed a 70-yard touchdown drive that provided crucial cushion.
— The running game resurfaced in the second half as Quali Conley broke loose for a 50-yard touchdown run that put the game out of reach.
— The defense played with a swarming, relentless joy that we had not seen from the battered unit in weeks. Arizona forced three turnovers, stuffed the Cougars on third and fourth down and limited big plays to a manageable number.
— The time-tested strategy for scoring points — chuck it in the general vicinity of Tetairoa McMillan — was executed deftly.
And so here they are, sitting on four wins with two games remaining: Eight precious quarters from snagging the bowl berth everyone assumed was a given before the season.
First up is TCU, an 11.5-point favorite over the Wildcats in Fort Worth.
Don’t be fooled into thinking the betting line means something. Last month, the Horned Frogs were 16.5-point home favorites but lost by double digits to the same Houston team that Arizona just walloped.
TCU is as good as anyone in the Big 12 when it’s right and as bad as anyone in the Big 12 when it’s wrong, and there’s no telling which team will show up Saturday.
Then comes the finale against Arizona State, which is enjoying the same pressure-free joy ride that Arizona experienced last year.
The roles have flipped along I-10 with a single-season ferocity not seen in decades. The Sun Devils are where Arizona expected to be — that is, contending for a conference title — and the Wildcats are exactly where ASU figured to be: scrambling for a bowl berth.
The contrasting trajectories make the multi-year rise in Tucson under Jedd Fisch and the multi-year swoon in Tempe under Herm Edwards seem tame by comparison.
(All of which begs the question long pondered and never answered: Why are the two football programs rarely good concurrently?)
But there’s time for one more role reversal, for Arizona to salvage the season, upset TCU and derail ASU’s title drive.
Put another way: The Wildcats won’t be overmatched in either game.
If they muster the same effort and execution on display in the second half against Houston, they should have a chance to win both.
After all, the Wildcats will have the best player on the field — McMillan — for those eight crucial quarters.
There’s one more element to consider in any potential late-season reclamation project: Nothing makes sense in the Big 12.
The team picked last, ASU, is one game out of first place.
The team picked first, Utah, is one game out of last place.
Kansas, which was 3-6, just won at Brigham Young, which was 9-0.
Up is down, down is up, powerhouses are nowhere to be found and chaos is the lone constant.
There’s no reason to believe the Wildcats can produce a season-saving sweep, which is exactly why you shouldn’t be surprised when it happens.
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