Arizona has not had much success against Utah under Jay Johnson, and the Wildcats have not had as many struggles as they have had recently with Johnson as the head coach. It has been a bit of a rocky start to the 2019 season so far for UA, but Sunday there was growth. What looked like it could become another one of the Wildcats' what-could-have-been type of games this season turned into an 18-7 dismantling of the Utes and a series victory over the Pac-12 opponent which has not been done during Johnson's time with the team.

UA (12-7, 2-1 Pac-12) was able to bounce back from a 21-10 loss Friday night with two wins to close out the series and build some momentum as an extended road trip looms for the team. UA heads into the toughest part of its schedule this week facing UCLA this week in Los Angeles after one last home game this Tuesday against New Mexico State.

The Wildcats needed to build some momentum this weekend and with their backs against the wall once again leading just 7-6 the team exploded for five runs and never turned back Sunday. It's the type of resiliency that Johnson likes to see and could be one of the moments that gets his team on track moving forward.

"I think it tells you a lot about who they are," Johnson said of his team's response to Friday night's loss with a series win Sunday. "... I know who they are. When you have a bad performance like that, from the outside it's easy to make a snap judgement on people. Luckily, I get to see into who they are everyday and I wasn't surprised at all."

Johnson said the inning when Utah closed the gap Sunday to within one run before UA finished the inning with five runs of its own in response was his favorite of the season. To have that type of performance to open Pac-12 play in a season that will only get tougher from here on out was important for the Wildcats.

"I think it's important," Johnson said. "There's a lot of new players, talented players and pitchers, and they just gotta get better as we go. I know everybody wants to win every game as we do, but it's important that as we win games that we improve as we're doing it. I think this was a good step.

"Now, Tuesday will be about Tuesday and another response, but I'm really pleased with that part of it."

The Wildcats can feel a bit of a change in the wind coming off the critical series victory, the second in as many weekends, and there is a certain amount of confidence the group has right now because it has had to work through some issues in the early part of the season.

"I think we have a lot of momentum building right now," freshman catcher and first baseman Austin Wells said. "We're on the upslope right now after coming back from a couple struggle games, and I think the defense is solid right now and we're getting through that. Pitching is coming in and really doing its job. And, the hitters just keep swinging away."

UA had some more issues defensively with four more errors in Sunday's game, but the group was able to play through those and make up for the mistakes. While Johnson would like to see his team eliminate the mistakes completely he was not disappointed with how it turned out Sunday because of how his team responded when the mistakes were made.

"They're not trying to suck or to throw balls or not make plays," Johnson said Sunday. "You could look at it two ways. After Nick [Quintana] made an error there was a ball to his left where he had great feet, played low and great feet to Cameron [Cannon] to turn the double play. After Jacob [Blas] made the error there was a ball up the middle, great feet to go get the ball and great feet to get into position to throw, and then threw an absolute strike to first base.

"That's probably more important getting to the next pitch. ... Those guys made some significant plays after they made mistakes. After we made mistake pitches we made significant pitches. So, the response to in-game adversity was the best thing that I saw today."

UA will face New Mexico State at 7 p.m. Tuesday night in its last game at Hi Corbett before playing its next seven games on the road.