[1] Despite finishing the season with six wins (which would have made them eligible for the postseason), the Wildcats did not earn an invitation to a bowl game, perhaps due to having a losing conference record.

Although the program was in a rebuild during the offseason, Stoops entered the 2006 season on the hot seat, in which there was a chance of him losing his job if the team did not win more games.

The Wildcats’ defense would come up big early, as they recovered a BYU fumble on its opening possession, which led to a field goal that put Arizona on the board for their first points of the season.

After both teams’ defenses dominated most of the fourth quarter, BYU was able to come through and tied the game with a field goal with under five minutes remaining.

In the closing seconds, Arizona attempted a field goal and would successfully convert the kick to win it and begin the year at 1–0.

[6] The game was full of dominance by the defense of both teams, which led to a low-scoring matchup, but Arizona did enough to get their first win over BYU since 1975 and their first at home since 1972.

[7] The eighth-ranked Tigers would dominate the Wildcats with a great offense and blitzing defense, with Arizona only scoring on field goal late in the fourth quarter.

However, USC lived up to its top-five ranking by adding ten more points in the quarter to ice the game for a 20–3 victory and dropped the Wildcats’ record to 2–2.

After a back and forth first half, the Bruins put the game away with a dominant defensive effort as the Wildcats’ struggles on offense continued.

[13][14] The Wildcats remained on the road and traveled to Stanford to take on a struggling and winless Cardinal team, and believed that it was their best chance at winning.

Arizona tried to respond late, but a pair of interceptions on their final drives would cost them and would lead to their fifth loss and pressure began to be put on Stoops with his job in danger as a result.

Neither team would threaten in the final frame, though it did not matter as the Wildcats would do enough to earn the upset and pick up their fourth win, which was the first time under Stoops that Arizona won more than three games in a season.

Later on, with time running down, Cal would again threaten and appeared to retake the lead with a touchdown, though a replay review overturned the would-be score, which gave the Wildcats yet another break.

A few plays later, Arizona would force another interception with over a minute and a half remaining and the Wildcats ran out the clock for the upset victory as fans rushed the field to celebrate the win.

[23][24][25] After upsetting California, the Wildcats looked to continue their momentum and traveled to Oregon to face the Ducks in their final road game of the season.

With a change at quarterback in the second half, it would affect the Wildcats’ offense for the rest of the game, as ASU would score a third-quarter touchdown to extend their lead to 28–14.