McDonald Kicking into high gear

Chris Richards Arizona Daily Wildcat Sophomore place kicker Mark McDonald follows through on a kick at practice. Despite adversity early on in his college career, McDonald has emerged as the Wildcats' starting place kicker on the heels on his game-winning field goal in Saturday's win over San Diego State.

Then his picture-perfect future was brought to a screeching halt.

Welcome to the competitive, dream-shattering world of college football.

McDonald came to Arizona from Loyola High School in Los Angeles in the fall of 1995, both expecting and expected to become the Wildcats' answer to the question of who would replace the school's third-all-time-leading scorer Steve McLaughlin.

He quickly learned things do not always come as easily as they appear.

"It was very frustrating, not slipping right into the kicking job," McDonald said. "It just doesn't happen like that in college. Things don't just fall into place."

McDonald handled kickoff duties for nine games during his freshman season but then redshirted last year when coaches realized Matt Peyton could handle all UA's kicking chores.

He returned to the team this year to compete for the placekicking job and was briefly tagged as a kickoff specialist, although that title was quickly dropped from his resume.

"After I got pulled from kickoff duties I was able to focus on just kicking field goals," McDonald said. "It made it easier for me to recognize what I was doing wrong."

Whatever was wrong with McDonald's kicking has since been remedied and the job appears to be his, for now.

"Mark and the rest of our kicking game have done a nice job the past few weeks," Arizona head coach Dick Tomey said. "We are very serious about taking pride in the performance of our special teams."

Serious and McDonald are two things that go together about as well as acids and bases.

McDonald appears to be the ring leader of the comedic-kicking trio that also includes punter Ryan Springston and kickoff specialist Tim Ferlan.

The three are only at practice for an hour or so a day, and take time out of every practice to crack jokes and hang out on the sidelines.

But the fun doesn't stop there.

"We are all friends and we hang out off the field," McDonald said. "This is the kind of situation the three of us like to be in. We all get a shot to do what we do best."

Some Wildcat supporters seem to think the trio's best just isn't good enough.

"The fans have no idea how hard it is to do what we do," Ferlan said in response to the criticism. "They think it's easy to get up there and kick a ball out of the end zone. But it's not a matter of if we can, it's a matter of doing what the coaches tell us to do. And the coaches are happy with what we are doing."

But what McDonald and Ferlan are doing, in fact, is the exact opposite of what they were originally recruited to do.

McDonald was expected to be a kickoff specialist while Ferlan, a product of Tucson's Salpointe Catholic High School, transferred to UA from Arizona Western Junior College in 1996 and was projected to become the Wildcats' full-time place kicker.

McDonald and Ferlan both said they are pleased with how things are going, despite the strange twist of fate.

"I am happy for Mark and what he has done, as well as (being) happy with where I am," Ferlan added.

Special teams coach Pete Alamar has no complaints either.

"I'd say I'm pleased with Mark's performance," Alamar said. "It comes at a good time and its been good for the team."

So has McDonald's relaxed attitude.

"I think that from a standpoint of feeling pressure, that laid-back attitude helps him," Alamar said.

When San Diego State called a timeout to ice McDonald just before his game-winning attempt, the coaches wanted to talk to McDonald about his technique and mechanics, but McDonald wanted nothing to do with that.

"He just told us, 'I just gotta make this thing. It's time to kick it,'" Alamar said.

McDonald said the timeout just before the kick actually helped him to gather himself and prepare for the pressure.

"I want coaches to call a timeout before I kick," McDonald said. "I know once I gather myself I am not going to miss."