Arizona knew the next trio. gunner maldonado, treydan stokes and dalton johnson He was scheduled to stay until 2024, but there were questions about whether he would be a junior cornerback. Tacario Davis After entering the transfer portal, join them on the backend.
Davis returned to the team on the first day of spring practice. He said he decided to stay to continue doing something special with the team.
“It's just to give the new coaches a look. You don't want to jump in there without knowing anything,” Davis said. “It really gave them a chance because everyone kept coming together for the team and everything. So I just wanted to be a part of something special and come together. I just wanted to be there, be around and see how the coach was doing. Let's give him a try and see what it's all about.”
Davis showed tremendous improvement from last season at UA. He played in all 13 games, started 11, and led the conference in pass breakups (15) and pass defense (16).
“That was huge,” Stokes said. “Tacario may have improved the most last season from the first game to the last. He has all the physical tools and is getting smarter as a football player. And with such a dominant Having the corner there will be a big help.”
Johnson, Maldonado and Stokes decided to go to the media room together and film an announcement video that would be shown on the big screen in the McKale Center during the Arizona-UCLA men's basketball game.
“It was great,” Johnson said. “This is the first time I've heard McKale's voice so loudly. It was very exciting and brought up a lot of emotions. But it's definitely the whole UA community, the school, the students supporting us. So it felt good.”
After the departure of the previous head coach Jed Fish The team came together and had internal conversations about keeping the band together.
“It was like a strange few days when everything first happened, but the three of us wanted to be together forever,” Maldonado said. “And when you get people like, Noah (Fifita) and T-mac (Tetairoa McMillian), someone who comes up to you and says let's stay home. It's very encouraging. ”
A sign of trust between UA's veteran DBs and the new head coach. brent brennan It was retention and promotion. Duane Akina Become a defensive coordinator. Retaining Akina left an element of familiarity with the players.
“It's definitely a big role for us,” Stokes said. “We talked a lot about how our growth is not a secret, and a lot of it is dedicated to Coach Akina's coaching methods and what he demands of us in practice every day. When Brennan hired him as DC, it definitely swayed our decision.”
Brennan has seen how close the back end of this defense is to each other and how they play together with freedom and trust.
“They're very close,” Brennan said. “I think the level he wants to play and the consistency of his performance is being on the back end with people he's played with before and knowing where they're going and trusting each of them. Other parts account for a large portion. ”
