EMILY REID/Arizona Daily Wildcat Arizona head football coach John Mackovic fields questions yesterday at a press conference wrapping up the team's spring season. Mackovic said the team's focus this season will be on improving last year's worst-ever 34.3 points allowed per game.

At John Mackovic's final news conference of the spring yesterday, it was obvious from the order and the time he spent talking about the defense that it's an area where he feels there needs to be the most improvement. The second-year coach spent the first 10 minutes of the news conference discussing different ways he has approached the defensive side of the ball this spring.

"One of the key things that I noticed from last year is that we didn't have enough people around the football," Mackovic said. "The truth is we didn't play effectively because we weren't around the football enough. So, that was a high priority this spring. We made improvement in that area."

Improvement will be needed if the Wildcats want to lower the 34.3 points they allowed per game in 2001, the most in school history.

One area in particular where he expressed concern was at the cornerback position, where he said the corners last year, "seemed to be a little bit on an island and were having to defend by themselves without much underneath help (linebackers) or over-the-top-help (safeties) at times."

In the Pacific 10 confrence, which boasts many receivers over 6-foot-4, such as Washington's Reggie Williams and Stanford's Teyo Johnson, Mackovic is aware of the challenge his secondary faces.

"Who can really run with the wide receivers in this conference?" Mackovic said. "They're big, they're fast, and they can run. We don't have that big tall receiver at this point (that we can practice on), so it's hard to make an assessment of whether or not they can shut down someone like that."

Mackovic said junior cornerback Michael Jolivette will be called upon to cover the opposition's best receiver but will need help, something he didn't have a lot of last season.

"I think Michael had a great spring, but if it's just Michael against every top receiver in the league and we don't do some things to help him out occasionally, even Michael could have a tough time," Mackovic said. "Fortunately, we're in the process of doing some things."

The Wildcats have two incoming players - Biren Ealy and Mike Jefferson - who could make a significant impact this season.

Ealy, who is 6-foot-4, could cause some of the matchup problems in the future against opposing teams that Mackovic was talking about earlier. Jefferson, despite being two inches shorter, could cause similar problems. UA's tallest returning receiver who played a significant role last season is junior Andre Thurman, who is almost 6 foot.

"Our receiving corps is an area where we will be looking for our two freshmen coming in to move into a position of playing right away," Mackovic said. "With Juan Valentine (junior college transfer) we added a player, but we will really miss Malosi Leonard and Brandon Marshall. I said last year that our wide receiving corps should not hold us back, and they didn't. Now, the new guys can come in and give us some talent and be able to make some plays for us."

Mackovic said the other 22 players that the Wildcats signed to national-letters-of-intent in February also have a chance to play this season.

One player in particular, Ryan O'Hara, is already penciled in as the third quarterback on the depth chart behind senior Jason Johnson and redshirt freshman Nic Costa.

"Does that mean he plays (this season) or that Nic is out? No," Mackovic said. "We will take a different approach. Last year, when Nic was here, we had John (Rattay) and Cliff (Watkins). So, we had a whole group of guys ahead of him, and it was hard to take Nic and stick him ahead of them. Well, we only have three (quarterbacks) this year so Ryan automatically gets into the rotation, but we also felt that he was someone who could come in."

Rattay now attends Pasadena City College and Watkins attends Tarleton State in Arlington, Texas. Both left Arizona after the season.

Overall, though, Mackovic said he was very pleased with the spring and especially the play of his quarterback Johnson.

Johnson, in the three scrimmages, completed 26 of 44 passes for two touchdowns and three interceptions. The part that Mackovic liked the most was his 59.1 completion percentage.

"Throughout the spring and into the spring game, Jason Johnson showed great growth and great maturity with what we want to do with our offense," Mackovic said. "I'm just excited where he is going and where he pushed himself to improve."

Mackovic went on to say that Costa's number-one priority this spring was to learn and adjust to the basic offense that was created for Johnson.

"Nic Costa learned a lot and did show good improvement," he said. "He would give us a different dimension at quarterback with him being able to pull it down and run with it. I'm not trying to create an alternate quarterback style necessarily similar to the Keith Smith and Ortege Jenkins style, where one would scramble and one would stay in the pocket or drop-back."

Costa finished spring practice completing 11 of 30 passes for 125 yards, no touchdowns and three interceptions.

Freshman tailback Tremaine Cox, who was academically ineligible for spring practice, was restricted by the dean to take only nine hours of class work this spring, according to Mackovic.

Mackovic said, "If he completes that successfully and the dean allows him to continue, because he is below where he should be, he could get his eligibility back for the fall."

Cox, who is not allowed to be on scholarship because he is academically ineligible and is now paying his own way to go to school, has told Mackovic that he is working hard.

Mackovic said that if eligible, he could play in the fall.

Cox finished last season with 230 yards, second best on the team.