{"id":483547,"date":"2026-11-02T01:36:09","date_gmt":"2026-11-02T01:36:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/483547\/"},"modified":"2026-11-02T01:36:09","modified_gmt":"2026-11-02T01:36:09","slug":"the-good-bad-and-ugly-from-arizonas-loss-to-texas-tech","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/483547\/","title":{"rendered":"The good, bad and ugly from Arizona&#8217;s loss to Texas Tech"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                    <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAQAAAAe\/WZNAAAAEElEQVR42mM8U88ABowYDABAxQPltt5zqAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==\" alt=\"FOOTBALL-NCAA\/\" class=\"img-responsive lazyload full\" width=\"1763\" height=\"1175\" data- data- itemprop=\"url\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Arizona quarterback Noah Fifita passes against Texas Tech in the first half at Galaxy Stadium in Lubbock, Texas, on Oct. 31, 2026.<\/p>\n<p>            Michael C. Johnson<\/p>\n<p>Fifita has a completion rate of 70% or higher in six games this season for the Wildcats. Fifita has a 19:4 touchdown-to-interception ratio this season.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Said Brennan: &#8220;Noah Fifita, what a warrior. Goodness gracious, he&#8217;s such a special kid. &#8230; I thought Noah did so many things to spark our offense all day. It just speaks to a warrior and what a great player he is.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The bad<\/p>\n<p>After Arizona took a 23-17 lead with just over five minutes left in the third quarter following a goal-line touchdown run by running back Kedrick Reescano, kicker Michael Salgado-Medina&#8217;s PAT was blocked because &#8220;there was a little bit of penetration in the A-gap and I&#8217;m not sure the trajectory of the kick is where it needed to be,&#8221; Brennan said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Texas Tech scored 17 straight points \u2014 highlighted by quarterback Thomas Castellanos&#8217; 27-yard pass to Kenny Johnson and running back J&#8217;Koby Williams&#8217; 64-yard touchdown run \u2014 and took a two-possession lead, but when the Wildcats trailed 27-23, Arizona faced a critical fourth-down decision in the middle of the fourth quarter.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>After Arizona safety Cam Chapa forced a fumble that was recovered by cornerback Dwight Bootle,\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Instead of kicking a field goal on fourth-and-1 from the Texas Tech 18-yard line, to make the score 27-26, the Wildcats went for it \u2014 a similar situation from their first of the loss of the season to BYU.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Fifita overshot leaping tight end Tyler Powell in the left flat for an incomplete pass \u2014 and a turnover on downs.\u00a0Fifita said, &#8220;I don&#8217;t know how you miss a 6-7 tight end, but I gotta eat that one.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The defense gave us so many opportunities to score points and we didn&#8217;t do so,&#8221; Fifita said. &#8220;We started slow and got stuck as well. I&#8217;ll take the blame for that. Gotta find opportunities to keep drives going. The fourth-down miss was a big one. I thought the defense played their asses off. I apologize for not having their back.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arizona quarterback Noah Fifita passes against Texas Tech in the first half at Galaxy Stadium in Lubbock, Texas,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483548,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[153,27625,6550,4938,162666,162665,162582,162581,2698,9369,9201,9371,9093,162475,168,170,169,6030,9095,6027,6029,6028,9200,162664,873,8868],"class_list":["post-483547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lubbock","tag-american-football","tag-american-football-bowls","tag-arizona","tag-arizona-football","tag-arizona-tcu","tag-arizona-tcu-football","tag-arizona-texas-tech","tag-arizona-texas-tech-football","tag-arizona-wildcats","tag-arizona-wildcats-football","tag-brent-brennan","tag-college-football-conference-seasons","tag-gridiron-football","tag-isaiah-mizell","tag-lubbock","tag-lubbock-headlines","tag-lubbock-news","tag-national-football-league","tag-ncaa-division-i-fbs-football-teams","tag-nfl-seasons","tag-nfl-teams","tag-nfl-teams-seasons","tag-noah-fifita","tag-texas-tech-footballl","tag-texas-tech-university","tag-touchdown"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=483547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}