A: Two sophomores, Arizona quarterback Khalil Tate and ASU receiver N’Keal Harry, are probably the only strong challengers to make the All-Pac-12 first team.
Harry is the most highly-recruited player on either roster. He was a five-star prospect from Chandler High School who chose the Sun Devils over Washington and Texas A&M. He’s a once-every-20-years recruit who, in my opinion, is the league’s most capable receiver, a likely NFL first-round selection next year.
Not only do the Sun Devils have the 6-foot 4-inch Harry, they’ve got super-elusive junior Kyle Williams, who has caught 55 passes, which is 18 more than Arizona leader Shun Brown. Imagine if Tate had those targets instead of Arizona’s smaller, less athletic group. It wouldn’t be fair.
Arizona blew it by not recruiting Williams; he had a strong Arizona connection. His high school coach, Coley Candaele, is the uncle of Casey Candaele, the starting third baseman on Arizona’s 1980 College World Series championship team.
Arizona’s receiving group lacks depth, speed and separation ability. It hasn’t had a receiving cast so unthreatening since the early 1990s. What happened?
Six of Arizona’s receiving recruits from 2013-16 were busts. Jessie Britt wound up at UMass. Darrell Clark is playing at Grambling. Darrell Cloy and Paul Elvira left the team. Salpointe Catholic product Kaelin Deboskie transferred to Pima College.
But the big loss was Cameron Denson, another Salpointe grad. He, too, left the UA team. Denson caught 73 passes for 1,453 yards as Salpointe won the 2013 state championship. He was the top receiving recruit from Tucson, by far, the last 25 years, and maybe since Sahuaro’s John Mistler, who went to ASU, in 1977. For whatever reason — being switched to defense among them — Denson’s career went south after catching just 15 passes. You can’t understate what a loss it is to this year’s pass-challenged team.
