No. 21 Arizona football lived up to its first Associated Press preseason Top 25 ranking in a decade on Saturday night with a 61-39 blasting of New Mexico, highlighted by junior wide receiver Tetairoa McMillan, a preseason All-American and likely top-10 2025 NFL Draft pick, going off for a school-record 304 yards receiving and four touchdowns. The tandem of T-Mac and quarterback Noah Fifita is going to light up Big 12 defenses this season, even if the coach who recruited them, Jedd Fisch, is at Arizona now.
McMillan averaged 30.4 yards on 10 catches and broke the Arizona single-game record of 283 yards receiving set by Jeremy McDaniel in 1996. McMillan matched Jacob Cowing’s touchdown catches record set against Southern California last season and fell 10 yards short of the Big 12 record set by Baylor’s Terrance Williams in 2012.
McMillan has a good chance in 2024 to finish as Arizona’s top career receiver in a handful of categories, and then he’ll go off to the NFL. Last season he hauled in 90 receptions, 1,402 yards and 10 touchdowns as Arizona went 10-3.
There are many ways to explain a program’s rise under Fisch — and we’re sure they are lessons new coach Brent Brennan will lean on to keep the momentum going and build on it. But for Arizona, it’s easy to pinpoint the origin in fortune: Orange County, California, home of the youth football powerhouse OC Buckeyes (their name recently changed to the Juice County Buckeyes).
That’s where Preseason All-Big 12 First Team linebacker Jacob Manu, Arizona starting tight end Keyan Burnett and, yes, McMillan and Fifita first joined forces.
They did so again at Anaheim (Calif.) Servite, transforming the Golden State school from a Trinity League afterthought to statewide…
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Author : Chris Hummer
Publish date : 2024-09-01 13:36:50
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