LAS VEGAS – So what if it was a Monday, and as far from March as possible in the college basketball season?
For one night at least, streams of Arizona fans wearing red turned T-Mobile Arena back into its old McKale North persona, outnumbering Florida fans probably 10-1.
There was plenty of blue in the stands but most of that was adorned with BYU Cougars logos, not the blue and orange of the Florida Gators.
Basically, it was the sort of embrace the Wildcats enjoyed for years during Pac-12 Tournaments at T-Mobile Arena, and much warmer than the reception they received for last season’s Big 12 Tournament at the T-Mobile Center.
“You don’t get this vibe in Kansas City,” UA alum Brian Talarico, an Atlanta-based veteran fan of several Pac-12 Tournaments, said during UA’s official “Pregame Meet Up” at Tom’s Watch Bar on The Strip.
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In all, Arizona fans made up about 60% of the first-game crowd overall with thousands of BYU fans arriving at various times before their Cougars faced Villanova in a later game.
While the Big 12 has contracted to hold its men’s basketball tournament in Kansas City through 2031, Talarico said Arizona would be better off playing a conference tournament in Las Vegas, where the Pac-12 Tournament was held before the conference’s 2024 implosion.
“We need it back because we have about 70% of the fans,” he said.
Talarico said he and several of his fraternity brothers – Ben Pearson of Indianapolis, Miguel Argueta of Arlington, Va., and Matthew Ward of Danville, Calif. — meet for Arizona basketball games at various sites around the country, including UA’s 2023-24 game against Purdue in Indianapolis.
Can’t shut him down
For Argueta, attending the Arizona-Florida game was also about making the best use of his time: He works for the U.S. Senate as a Sergent at Arms, working on budget analysis.
Basically, that means he’s out of work right now thanks to the government shutdown and isn’t sure what’s next.
“We’re supposed to get back-paid but it’s up in the air,” he said.
Vegas donor trip
Arizona annually invites its top donors along for the ride to one road game every season, and this season’s choice was pretty much automatic: About 200 of Arizona’s top donors came along with the Wildcats for the game.
Arizona AD Desiree Reed-Francois said she, UA coach Tommy Lloyd and point guard Jaden Bradley all talked to the donors at an evening gathering after their arrival Sunday while the donors were also invited to a pregame function on Monday.
Even though Reed-Francois had less than 12 hours to turnaround from the UA football team’s flight back from Colorado early Sunday to the charter flight to Las Vegas on Sunday afternoon, she said “it was a great trip.”
Backed up
Also reminiscent of past Pac-12 Tournaments, Monday’s game featured some Vegas-style entertainment. Country singer Sierra Black sang the national anthem, while Chinese foot juggler Pei Pei bounced around all sorts of objects with her feet while lying on her back.
Pei Pei finished her routine by kicking a ball up three levels of a metal structure, then from the top level into a small basketball hoop, earning loud applause.
Mr. Pibb goes flat
Among the pregame promotional setups outside T-Mobile Arena was a tent in which Mr. Pibb promoters were giving out free black hats with the soda’s logo.
As of an hour before the UA-Florida game, only a couple of BYU fans took advantage.
Remember him?
Among the other large crowd of fans — BYU’s — was a guy who rode up the long escalator to the nosebleeds wearing a “Fredette” jersey.
Jimmer Fredette still owns the McKale single-game scoring record when he dropped 49 points during a 30-point BYU win over the Wildcats during the 2009-10 season.
A year later, Fredette scored 33 points while BYU beat the Elite Eight-bound Wildcats 87-65 in Salt Lake City. After that game, Miller appeared to shake Fredette’s hand in surrender.
“He said, ‘I tell you what, if you need anything from anybody, I’m your guy,’ ” Fredette said of Miller. “He said, ‘anything you need, you let me know and I’ll get it for you.’ I was like, ‘All right. Thanks, coach. Appreciate it.’ ”
No love for UA veterans
Arizona’s veteran players picked up some extra incentive last week, when none of them made the watch lists for positional awards announced by the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame.
Neither Tobe Awaka nor Motiejus Krivas were among the 20 players named to the watch list for the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award for the top center. Awaka, who will play both post positions this season, was also not named to the Karl Malone Award list for top power forward.
The only Arizona players who made the positional watch lists were freshmen: Koa Peat on the Malone list and Brayden Burries on the Jerry West shooting guard list.
Meanwhile, former Arizona post player Henri Veesaar was named to the Abdul-Jabbar list Friday after transferring to North Carolina, as was former Cochise College and Washington State center Oscar Cluff, now of Purdue.
Championship row
Starting with Monday’s game against 2025 NCAA champion Florida, Arizona is scheduled to face every program that has won an NCAA title since COVID wiped out the 2020 event.
The Wildcats will play at UConn, the 2023 and 2024 champs, on Nov. 19, then face the 2022 (Kansas) and 2021 (Baylor) champs during Big 12 Conference play.
The Wildcats, of course, will also be facing a Houston team that lost to Florida in the NCAA title game last season and is among the favorites to win it all this season.
Triple burger
For the second straight season, Arizona has three McDonalds All-Americans on the roster this season.
The Wildcats lost Caleb Love (2020) and Carter Bryant (2024) off last season’s team but now have the program’s 31st and 32nd veterans of the prestigious high school all-star game to join guard Jaden Bradley (2022) in forward Koa Peat and guard Brayden Burries.
Numbers game
9 – Years since Arizona played a ranked opponent in its season opener, dating back to a 65-63 win over Michigan State in Honolulu to begin the 2016-17 season.
Contact sports reporter Bruce Pascoe at [email protected]. On X(Twitter): @brucepascoe
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