Arizona baseball had won five of its last seven games, which included three road wins, entering Friday evening’s matchup with Kansas State.
Arizona
Cardinals embarrassed by Commanders in Kingsbury's return
GLENDALE –Embarrassment. That was the word best associated with the end of the Kliff Kingsbury era with the Arizona Cardinals.
Whether it be the product on the field — especially at home — or the mountain of distractions off of it, there was no escaping it for the franchise.
Fast forward to two seasons later, and embarrassment was again coursing through State Farm Stadium with Kingsbury in attendance, albeit for a completely different reason.
In his return to Arizona as the Washington Commanders offensive coordinator, Kingsbury and former Arizona State Sun Devil Jayden Daniels again had their offense rolling, carving up the Cardinals to the tune of 42-14 on Sunday.
“We got a couple stops on defense. We scored some points, but not a lot (of positives),” head coach Jonathan Gannon said postgame. “This league is very humbling and we got humbled today.”
Even with Washington’s scoring and turnover streaks coming to an end, the Commanders had more than enough offense to get the job done on Sunday.
As a team, Washington amassed 449 yards of offense and scored on all but two of its drives throughout the afternoon.
Outside of an early interception, the Cardinals defense really had no answer for Daniels, who completed 86.7% of his passes (26-for-30) for 233 yards and a touchdown. He was not sacked.
“He’s a good player. He’s dynamic,” head coach Jonathan Gannon said postgame. “We had him wrapped up a couple times and he got out of it and made some plays with his legs. He gets the ball out and he’s accurate.
“I give him a lot of credit, but we’ve got to do a better job of affecting the quarterback.”
Washington’s run game had little resistance, too, rushing for 216 yards and four touchdowns on 37 carries. Daniels had his handprints in the run game, too, behind 47 yards and a touchdown on eight carries.
The Commanders offense absolutely took it to the Cardinals on Sunday. But it was Kingsbury’s victory laps down the sideline on seemingly every Washington touchdown scored — getting a peek at the Arizona sideline every now and again — that was the proverbial twist of the knife for Cardinals fans.
And for as bad as the defense looked, the offense wasn’t much better.
In what’s become a common theme for the Cardinals this season, they had little trouble scoring on their opening drive behind a quarterback Kyler Murray two-yard touchdown pass to rookie wide receiver Marvin Harrison Jr.
Much like last week, though, Arizona’s offense couldn’t back up the quick start. After going 55 yards for the score on the opening drive, the Cardinals registered just 51 yards across the next five possessions before eventually finding the end zone for a final time late in the third quarter.
Among the most glaring issues for the Cardinals offense was the inability to move the chains on third down, converting four times out of 11 tries (36%).
The poor third-down conversion rate has been a recurring theme in recent weeks, with the Cardinals going 1-for-9 on third down in last week’s loss to the Lions.
“We gotta be able to stay on the field,” Murray said postgame. “That’ll take a lot of the pressure off the defense. We all work together. When you can’t stay on the field on third down and the defense is always on the field, they get worn down and vice versa. As a team, we have to be better.”
Seeing Kingsbury back on the sidelines of State Farm Stadium was bound to bring back some memories for Cardinals fans.
They probably didn’t expect the Cardinals to pay homage to Kingsbury’s last ride in Arizona with that kind of performance, though.
A positive in waiting?
If you can find a positive outside of two defensive stops and a pair of touchdowns, take a bow. That’s harder than finding Waldo.
But while the negatives are front and center, how Arizona responds in the aftermath of the beatdown will speak a lot to the makeup of this team.
“We’ll get back to it and the positive will be what we get out of this tape tomorrow, the adjustments that we make, the corrections that we make and we’ll get better from it,” Gannon said. “That’ll be the positive from it.”
In these four-round projections, the Arizona Cardinals don’t get a tackle until the fourth round.
We are just days away from the 2026 NFL draft, and that means some final mock drafts. What direction will the draft take the Arizona Cardinals?
Draft Wire’s Curt Popejoy put together a four-round mock draft for the Cardinals. They go defense early but rebuild the offense for 2026 and moving forward, including landing their potential franchise quarterback.
Cardinals 4-round mock draft
Here are the players in the first four rounds Popejoy projects for Arizona.
- Round 1: Ohio State EDGE/LB Arvell Reese
- Round 2: Alabama QB Ty Simpson
- Round 3: Clemson WR Antonio Williams
- Round 4: Florida OT Austin Barber
What we think of the picks
The Cardinals want to trade out of the third pick and draft a tackle, so not getting a tackle until Round 4 seems unlikely, although they did meet with Barber. They do have options at right tackle for 2026 already on the roster.
Reese would be a great pick if they don’t trade back, as they badly need pass-rushing help off the edge.
Drafting Simpson seems inevitable at this point, so it has to be in a mock draft, although the feeling is they will need to go up into Round 1 again to get him.
Williams has speed and is almost six feet tall, but he does have short arms.
Get more Cardinals and NFL coverage from Cards Wire’s Jess Root and others by listening to the latest on the Rise Up, See Red podcast. Subscribe on Spotify, YouTube or Apple podcasts.
Due to significant injuries to the CB position last year which includes a shoulder surgery for Terrion Arnold, the Lions CB position scored a 6/10 need on my Lions Defensive Draft Need Rankings. Thus, an early-round selection of a young, healthy prospect like Keith Abney would not come as a surprise. He enters the draft with very low medical concern level.
Here is the excerpt from my medical report on Keith Abney:
(Ages in parentheses are at start of 2026 season and are factored into the concern level. Injury info and ages based on available public information are unverified and subject to update. Games played data courtesy of sports-reference.com.)
Keith Abney, CB (21) – Arizona State
Projected round 2-3. #43 on Jeff Risdon board Feb 19.
Concern level 0/10
There is an isolated report of a hand injury but no corroborating information. Even if the hand injury is true, that’s of minimal to no long-term concern.
His availability in his final two seasons has been perfect. Overall, Abney appears to be medically clean and is at an excellent age.
He finished college with 6 INT and 21 PBU.
For more Lions coverage, follow us on X, @TheLionsWire, and give our Facebook page a like. Follow Jimmy on X, @JimmyLiaoMD
In the first game of the series, Arizona (14-23, 5-11 Big 12) battled in a low-scoring affair but fell short in a 2-1 loss to Kansas State (24-12, 8-8 Big 12). The Wildcats from Tucson held the Wildcats from Manhattan at bay for a good majority of the night.
Given that Kansas State leads the Big 12 in conference play in batting, on-base percentage, and slugging, Arizona had a rather good performance, but it was not enough.
Owen Kramkowski pitched seven scoreless innings before allowing the first Kansas State run in the top of the eight. He finished with six strikeouts and kept the high octane Wildcats at bay.
“I thought the defense played well behind him too,” said head coach Chip Hale. “There’s a lot of ground balls, and we made plays where we were positioned in good places, and he was pitching in the eighth inning. That’s unbelievable.”
Garrett Hicks (3-1) came in to try and stop the bleeding for the Wildcats and did so by not allowing Kansas State to take the lead in the eighth. It was in the ninth when the lead was surrendered.
It took until the sixth inning but the first run was scored by Arizona. Andrew Cain singled to left field and after Maddox Mihalakis flew out, it was Beau Sylvester bringing Cain home with a triple through right center field.
Sylvester extended his hitting streak to eight games and it proved to be not enough to get Arizona to the finish line.
Kansas State tied the game at the top of the eight when back to back singles got runners on at first and third. Then a passed ball allowed the third base runner to come home.
Arizona had a chance to retake the lead in the bottom of the ninth after Cain singled to deep right field. With Sylvester back at the plate, it seemed like it was a perfect set up.
A wild pitch nearly got past Kansas State and Cain tried to take advantage of it and steal home. However, Kansas State was able to corral the pitch and get Cain out at home.
AJ Evasco started the ninth inning with a double for Kansas State and back to back fly outs eventually got him home to give Kansas State the lead and the win.
With eight players being left on base, Arizona will need to bring those runners in more often than not if they want to tie the series Saturday afternoon.
As a young team, the Wildcats have had to walk a very tight line between disappointment and dejection and will need to continue handling these losses with grace if it wants to turn a corner.
“It’s the way it goes, it’s baseball,” said Hale. “If we don’t handle it, we will come out tomorrow and won’t be ready to go, so hopefully they handle it.”
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