Coach Tyrone Willingham made room on the 64-man travel roster to take injured quarterback Jake Locker along on this trip. Locker's leadership is always considered valuable, but there had been some question if he would be cleared to fly so soon after surgery on his broken right thumb.

Obviously, he was.

Meanwhile, I've also arrived in Tucson, and I'm sorry to be so predictable but it really must be a dry heat because it feels perfectly comfortable out there even though it's supposed to be around 90 degrees.

The gameday forcast also calls for temperatures around 90... and then lower because of the 4:30 kickoff. (Arizona time is the same as Pacific time this time of year.) Also, there's a chance of Saturday night showers.

"(The heat) will have some impact," coach Tyrone Willingham said at mid-week. "... Our guys will have to go through some adjustment. We talk to them constantly about hydration so that they prepare themselves. It's not something you can do overnight, it's something you have to continually work at. For our guys that it has been problematic with it, you try to do some extra things. And just advise the other guys to keep putting the fluids in to avoid the problem."

Meanwhile, the most interesting news in the local papers that I've spotted so far is the Arizona Daily Star's report that Arizona has taken the first steps toward a stadium-improvement project a few seasons down the line.