Arizona Football: Nate Phillips ready to bring his A+ Game

Senior Arizona Football receiver and return man Nate Phillips isn’t looking forward to the end of his college career; he’s having too much fun playing football in Tucson.

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Nate Phillips has changed his number this season from No. 6 to No. 11. Along with his new number, he has a refreshed attitude and relaxed demeanor that comes along with a seasoned senior leader. “It feels like it’s my time, but then again, it’s like wow, three years have flown by, and I’m already in my last season,” said Phillips, “But it feels good to be a senior, to be one of the guys who made it, three or four years of academics and football.”

Last season Nate Phillips made 44 catches for 564 yards and four touchdowns in just nine games as he was sidelined for a couple of games with an injury. Phillips would end up inscribing himself into the Arizona Football history books with a spectacular one-handed touchdown catch while falling into the end zone. His catch sealed the Cats double-overtime upset win against the ranked Utah Utes.

It was one of the most celebrated catches of the season, one of those plays Wildcats will never forget.

Could he possibly outdo himself in 2016? We were curious what Nate’s top goal was going into his senior season. “I don’t know, outperform myself in my freshman year? Other than that I just want to make the plays in the game; it doesn’t matter if they’re big plays or small plays.”

Coach Rich Rodriguez has been changing things up lately, with his new defensive coaching staff, no spring game, and more. It seems there is a new attitude and a new way of doing things in Coach Rod’s 2016 Spring Practice. He had started his team’s spring practice weeks before the Trojans have; they just started this week.

Practice is way different according to Nate, “It’s dramatically different. We have walk-throughs during practice which we haven’t done before. We do it in the beginning, but we’ll stop and have three or periods where we walk through. It’s completely different.”

Rest assured fans, your head coach has a mission. This is Nate’s fourth season, so if he is saying it’s different it is. “You can tell he’s [Coach Rod] really focusing in on getting us to learn what we’re supposed to do, really teaching you out there on the field so we can walk through it as opposed to drawing it on the white board.”

ZonaZealots was curious how the Seniors were treating the freshmen, so we asked Nate. “The only thing you have to do is the Gong Show, that’s at the end of fall camp,” he said, “It’s basically a talent show, but more, you know, just being funny, get comfortable in front of people.”

He remembered something else, “One of the ways you’ll get razzed on or whatever is if you have something funny about you,” he was chuckling a bit here, “You’ll get a nickname that you cannot live down. It’ll be something they do at practice, it’ll be anything, and it will turn into your nickname for your college career, that’s what you’re called.”

Bummer! We forgot to ask him if he ever got a nickname! Nate, if you read this, we are dying to know.

Here’s part of our interview care of Gabe Encinas of Arizona Desert Storm:

We wish you the best season of your college career, we look forward to celebrating your accomplishments this season!

More wildcats: Arizona Wildcats: Top 30 athletes in school history

BearDown Nate!

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