Mike Stoops is coming home. Stoops played safety for Iowa in the early 80s. He was on the 1982 Rose Bowl Team, and was a grad assistant and volunteer coach after graduating. He is now the head coach of the Arizona Wildcats, Iowa’s third opponent of the year. The Wildcats are coming off a good 8-5 season that included a big Pioneer Las Vegas Bowl win against BYU and wins over Cal and rival Arizona State. Arizona will bring a powerful spread attack that averaged 36.6 points and over 400 yards per game in 2008. The defense is experienced with 4 seniors and 5 juniors and is led by another Stoops: Mark, another Iowa guy.

Offense: Key Returning Players
The star of the offense is TE Rob Gronkowski, a 3rd team All American. Though his missed a couple of games last year with mono, he still finished the season with 10 touchdown receptions and 672 yards. He was also a larger contributor to the Wildcats’ run game as a blocker. Two wide receivers, Delashaun Dean and Terrell Turner are back and combined with Gronkowski, the receiving corps should be good. Also returning is RB Nic Grigsby, the team leading rusher with 1153 yards. The three starters on the interior line will also be back.

Offense: Key Losses
Arizona loses four starters on offense, and none is bigger than QB Willie Tuitama. The quarterback threw for over 3000 yards last year racking up 23 touchdowns. Replacing Tuitama is a priority, as the leading returning quarterback only had 11 pass attempts last year.

Defense: Key Returning Players
There are 7 returning starters for the Wildcats on defense including the entire defensive line. The leaders of the line will be DE Brooks Reed who had 8 sacks last year, and DT Earl Mitchell. In the secondary, CB Devin Ross returns. Ross had 13 pass break ups and 3 interceptions last year and was 2nd team All Pac-10.

Defense: Key Losses
The four non-returning starters are CB Marquis Hundley, LB Ronnie Palmer, FS Nate Ness, and LB Adrian McCovy. Palmer and Ness are the biggest losses. Both started every game last year and were the team’s two leading tacklers with 85 and 75 tackles respectively. Palmer also had 11 of the team’s 69 tackles for loss in 2008.

For more information on Arizona’s 2009 football team, here is the Spring Prospectus.