1980 Arizona Wildcats football team

The 1980 Arizona Wildcats football team represented the University of Arizona in the Pacific-10 Conference (Pac-10) during the 1980 NCAA Division I-A football season. In their first season under head coach Larry Smith, the Wildcats compiled a 5–6 record (3–4 against Pac-10 opponents), finished in a tie for sixth place in the Pac-10, and were outscored by their opponents, 275 to 215. The team played its home games in Arizona Stadium in Tucson, Arizona.

Despite finishing the season with a 5–6 record, the Wildcats defeated UCLA (who was ranked second at the time), which would become the first of several signature moments during Smith's tenure with the program.

The team's statistical leaders included Tom Tunnicliffe with 1,204 passing yards, Hubert Oliver with 655 rushing yards, and Tim Holmes with 545 receiving yards. Linebacker Jack Housley led the team with 104 total tackles.

Before the season
Arizona finished the 1979 season with a 6–5 record, and lost to Pittsburgh in the Fiesta Bowl. During the offseason, head coach Tony Mason was discovered as being allegedly involved in a cash payment scandal by giving boosters money to players, which was illegal under NCAA rules. As a result, Mason resigned as coach and was replaced by Smith, who was coaching at Tulane. Smith was a former assistant coach at Arizona under Mason's predecessor Jim Young. In a press conference, Smith promised to rebuild the program and bring the team to a winning success.

Colorado State
Arizona opened the season against ex-WAC foe Colorado State in Smith's debut as Wildcat coach. The Rams converted on a field goal on the last play of the game to win it.

California
The Wildcats went on the road to Berkeley to face California. Arizona narrowly defeated the Golden Bears to give Smith not only his first win as Arizona coach, but his first Pac-10 victory as well as his first road win.

Iowa
The Wildcats traveled to Iowa in their next game against the Hawkeyes. Both Arizona and Iowa's offenses struggled throughout the game, but the Wildcats’ defense dominated and scored a safety early by blocking a punt. Arizona ultimately held on for the victory. It was one of the only games in college football history in which a team won by only scoring exactly five points. It was also Arizona's fifth consecutive win over Iowa dating back to 1970. They would not defeat the Hawkeyes again until 1998.

USC
In Smith's first big test as Arizona's coach, the Wildcats took on USC, who was ranked second in the nation. The Trojans would hold the Wildcats to only ten points to win. Smith would become a future coach at USC in 1987.

Notre Dame
Arizona played Notre Dame for the first time since 1941, with Notre Dame making its first visit to the state of Arizona. At home against the tough fourth-ranked Fighting Irish, the Wildcats never had a chance as they would be outplayed and scored only a field goal.

To date, this remains Notre Dame's only visit to Tucson (and very likely the only time ever), as the Wildcats believed that it would be too expensive to schedule a home game against a storied non-conference opponent like the Irish, allegedly since Tucson is a small market.

UCLA
For homecoming, Arizona hosted second-ranked UCLA. The Bruins were poised to get the top ranking with a win, as Alabama lost to Mississippi State earlier that day. However, the Wildcats put those hopes to rest by upsetting the Bruins and finally giving Smith his first home win as coach. It was also Smith's first big win at Arizona. The win by Arizona, combined with Alabama's loss, stunned the college football world as the top two ranked teams lost that day.

Arizona State
In the rivalry game, Arizona and Arizona State faced each other. For the Wildcats, this was Smith's first matchup against ASU. The more experienced Sun Devils dominated the mistake-prone Wildcats in a blowout, as most of the Arizona Stadium crowd had already headed for the exits by the time the fourth quarter began. Arizona managed to get on the scoreboard with a touchdown in the third quarter that prevented a shutout against a blitzing Arizona State defense.

Days after the game (and season) ended, Smith said in an interview that he claimed that ASU's dominance over Arizona in the rivalry at the time was a result of Arizona State being located in the larger Phoenix area (ASU's campus is in the suburb Tempe), as UA is located in Tucson, with its metro area being smaller than Phoenix's, and referred to ASU as the state's “de facto NFL team” as a result (the state of Arizona did not get an NFL team until 1988 when the Cardinals relocated from St. Louis), and that it led to the Wildcats being consistently played in the Sun Devils’ shadow due to Arizona State's performance under the coaching prestige of former coach Frank Kush, who was fired midway through the previous season. Smith later said that as the new coach, he vowed to rebuild the program to build a bright future and to lead the Wildcats to a winning tradition.

The Wildcats finished Smith's first season with a record of 5–6.

Season notes

 * Smith's first season was known as a rebuilding year to fans. An extremely difficult schedule also affected Arizona's chances at a bowl game, and led to the team's mediocre record.
 * The season was the only one in the 1980s that Arizona finished with a losing record and one of only two seasons in the decade that they had a non-winning record (the other was in 1987 when they went 4–4–3).
 * Also, this season started a decade of resurgence for the Wildcats, fulfilling Smith's promise when he was hired before the season started (see above).
 * Arizona did not play Texas Tech for the first time since 1970.
 * From mid-October through early November, the Wildcats played four consecutive home games.
 * The victory over UCLA was the first big win under Smith, which became overshadowed by Arizona's upset of USC (UCLA's chief rival) during the following season.
 * This season was the only one in Smith lost to ASU at home. Arizona did not lose to their rival at home again until 1992.
 * The game against Arizona State had the earliest start time in Arizona Stadium history. The 10:00 a.m. kickoff was due to the fact that the game was televised regionally and that there were scheduling conflicts within the broadcasting window, meaning that there wasn't an open afternoon/evening time slot available for the game to kick off.
 * This was the last season until 2012 that Arizona wore red helmets and also the last season until 2005 that they wore red jerseys for home games. The red helmets had been worn since the 1977 season and were previously used from 1967 to 1972 and the red jerseys had been their primary home jerseys since 1977. Arizona officials believed that the team wearing red was too confusing with Pac-10 schools USC, Stanford, Arizona State, and Washington State, whose colors are a variation and/or a darker shade of red (Arizona and conference foe California have blue as one of their colors, though Arizona's blue is slightly lighter than California's, who has a darker shade of blue). Beginning in 1981, the Wildcats returned to wearing blue jerseys at home and white helmets for the first time since 1976. Prior to 1977, Arizona had worn the blue jerseys. The helmets would feature a red “A” on them and it was worn by players until the end of the 1989 season.
 * This was the first of only two seasons in the 1980s that Arizona did not have an overall winning record with the other occurring in 1987 (in which was the first season after Smith left Arizona and finished with a non-losing 4–4–3 record), and the only one in the decade in which the Wildcats compiled an actual losing record (5–6).

After the season
Although the Wildcats finished the 1980 season with a losing record, they would begin improving under Smith and started to compete with the other conference teams, as Arizona completed their third season as a Pac-10 member, and would build a winning culture for both the university and the Tucson community that lasted through most of the 1980s and the team would become known for their upset victories under Smith's watch. Even though they would later be punished for their part in the scandal prior to Smith's hiring, Arizona would bring in recruits to bring success to start a period of dominance that would surprise fans across Arizona and credit Smith for making the Wildcats a relevant team again, like what Young did during the mid-1970s.