In more than 120 years of Arizona football, only eight have reached the 9-win mark. Had the Wildcats pulled off that comeback in the Holiday Bowl they would have finished off just the fifth 10-win season in school history.
“That is incredibly impressive from a team that was picked to be dead last in the Big 12,” UA coach Brent Brennan said Friday night.
There wasn’t an official Big 12 preseason poll, but if there had been one Arizona would have been somewhere near the bottom after going 4-8 in Brennan’s
first season. An almost completely new roster for 2025 made for plenty of uncertainty, which remained even after a 3-0 start and intensified after back-to-back one-score losses in October to fall to 4-3.
Then the Wildcats broke off five straight wins, three on the road, took back the Territorial Cup and ended up in the final College Football Playoff rankings.
“We didn’t finish how we wanted to, but I love this team,” quarterback Noah Fifita said after the Holiday Bowl loss to SMU. “This is probably the most fun I’ve had playing football. I love this team. I love these coaches, and best believe when we get back in two weeks, Team 123 is going to get to work.”
The 122nd edition of Arizona football did pretty well, but can that success get carried over to next season? Two years ago the UA was in a similar situation, bringing back some big names but also needing to fill some big holes, and then Jedd Fisch abruptly left and what followed was chaos.
Brennan isn’t going anywhere, and barring a major surprise coordinators Seth Doege and Danny Gonzales will both be back for 2026.
Here’s our assessment of how the program looks heading into 2026:
Who’s coming back?
Fifita confirmed immediately after the Holiday Bowl he was returning for his senior season, citing “unfinished business.” That’s a huge piece of the puzzle for 2026, as Fifita will become Arizona’s career passing leader with 829 more yards to go with his single-season (29) and career (73) touchdown records.
It will also be Fifita’s second year in Doege’s offense, which will mark the first time he’s had the same play caller for consecutive seasons since becoming the starter. After an inconsistent first half to 2025 Fifita was tremendous down the stretch.
His leadership and experience will be needed even more next year, as there aren’t a lot of offensive weapons coming back.
Gone is leading rusher Ismail Mahdi, who had 859 yards and had nearly half the carries among the three main running backs. But Kedrick Reescano and Quincy Craig are set to return, and they combined for 14 total TDs, and the young duo of Cornelius Warren and Wesley Yarbrough both showed promise in their limited action and are poised for a bigger role.
The running back room will now be in the control of Lyle Moevao, taking over for Alonzo Carter who left to become head coach at Sacramento State.
Departing pass catchers accounted for 181 of 281 completions, producing about 60 percent of the yardage and 16 of 29 TDs. But set to be back for 2026 are Tre Spivey, Chris Hunter and Gio Richardson, who combined for 71 catches, 1,052 yards and nine TDs.
The defense has even more holes to fill. With safety Genesis Smith expected to enter the NFL Draft, only 49 of 143 starts from 2025 are in line to return. That does include edge Tre Smith, who should earn a medical redshirt after having shoulder surgery in October.
Mays Pese is a star in the making on the defensive line, starting four of the last five games as a true freshman, and if Myron Robinson can come back after his season-ending injury he can help anchor the linebacker corps alongside rising senior Taye Brown.
As of Monday, Arizona has 14 players in the NCAA transfer portal but only one—offensive lineman Michael Wooten—started a game during the 2025 season.
Offseason needs
Arizona must replace three starters on the offensive line, technically four with Tristan Bounds starting eight games before getting hurt. Alexander Doost is the only returning full-time starter up front, so loading up on big blockers will be a priority for the Wildcats in the portal.
Same goes for tight end, where Tyler Powell is back but he’s coming off an injury suffered on the first snap of the 2025 season. The UA has already offered multiple tight end targets and will look at least at least two at this position.
Almost every spot on defense has a need for either a starter or depth, so expect the majority of portal pickups to come from that side of the ball. The top priorities are in the secondary, where all five starters will be gone, and on the outside in the front seven.
Potential impact signees
The UA signed 20 players last month, though one (3-star safety Griffin Tillis) has since asked out of his letter of intent and two others (offensive lineman Nathan Allen and defensive lineman Harvie Moeai) are taking LDS missions before joining the program.
The majority of Arizona’s signees are expected to enroll in January, thus making them available for spring practice and getting a leg up on contributing in the fall. Of that group, the one that is most likely to step right in an contribute is junior college edge rusher Kevin Moorer.
4-star cornerback Xaier Hiler and 3-star defensive linemen Prince Williams and Manoah Faupusa could also be in the mix early, as could receivers RJ Mosley and Caleb Smith.
The 2026 schedule
With 15 Big 12 opponents but only nine conference games there can be some luck involved in who you play, or more importantly don’t play, each season. In 2025 Arizona avoided College Football Playoff qualifier Texas Tech and the most potent Utah offense in years but did play (and lose to) the conference’s two other 10-win teams, BYU and Houston.
It also played four of the league’s six teams that finished with losing records, beating them all. Including nonconference foes, Arizona’s 12 FBS opponents had a combined to go 83-68, compared to 81-59 in 2025.
Next season’s Big 12 slate, at least on paper, is going to be much harder. Eight of nine league opponents finished at .500 or better, the only one that didn’t was 4-8 West Virginia. That’s one of the UA’s four Big 12 road games, along with trips to BYU, Kansas State and Texas Tech.
At home the Wildcats get Cincinnati, Iowa State, TCU and Utah and host the Territorial Cup.
Throw in home games against NAU and Northern Illinois and a trip to former Pac-12 foe Washington State and the combined 2025 record of next season’s FBS opponents is 87-54.
The season opener is Sept. 5 against NAU and currently Week 2 is open, as Arizona’s other nonconference games are Sept. 19 (Northern Illinois) and Sept. 26 (at Washington State). There’s only one bye week in 2026, based on how the calendar fell, so either the Wildcats will have to play 11 straight weeks to end the season or they’ll play a conference game on Sept. 12.
Expect that to be in Provo, as BYU is the only other Big 12 school that doesn’t have a game scheduled for Week 2. The Cougars recently canceled a home-and-home with Cal, whom they were going to play that week.
