Oklahoma State football: Arizona offense no longer similar

OSU routed Arizona in both 2010 (36-10) and 2011 (37-14) despite UofA sporting an NFL-caliber quarterback. Nick Foles now is a Philadelphia Eagle, and ‘Zona has a new quarterback in Matt Scott who is a nice fit for new coach Rich Rodriguez’s offense.

In a 24-17 overtime victory over Toledo last Saturday, Scott completed 30 of 46 passes for 387 yards and two touchdowns. Scott also rushed 14 times for 74 yards.

Foles was a lot like Brandon Weeden; a classic dropback passer. But the RichRod offense usually features quarterbacks who are dual threats, guys like West Virginia’s Pat White and Michigan’s Denard Robinson.

OSU coach Mike Gundy said run/pass quarterbacks “stress everybody on defense. We saw it early in Robert Griffin’s career (at Baylor).Missouri’s quarterback (James Franklin) did it some. (Texas A&M’s Ryan) Tannehill gave you some stress. Zac Robinson did it here for us.

“Your outside ‘backers, they get stressed more than anybody, in our opinion.”

The last two OSU-Arizona games have been mirror offenses, it’s just that the Cowboys’ offense has been much better. But both offenses stemmed from Mike Leach. Dana Holgorsen and Sonny Dykes were on Leach’s Texas Tech staff together from 2000-06.

In 2007, then-Arizona coach Mike Stoops hired Dykes as offensive coordinator to install the Air Raid offense. Dykes stayed three years, then became Louisiana Tech’s head coach.

In 2008, Holgorsen moved to Houston as offensive coordinator, then Gundy hired him in 2010 to install the Air Raid offense. Now Holgorsen is the head coach at West Virginia.

So both the OSU and Arizona offenses came from the same root, despite variances developed by both coaches.

But RichRod’s offense is nothing at all like the Air Raid. It’s a total makeover.