ASU Football: Sun Devil linebackers have had a taste of success but are hungry for more

(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)

After Arizona State’s 16-13 upset of then No. 15 Michigan State just under two weeks ago, in a game where the Spartans were held to just 63 yards on the ground and 4-12 on third down, defensive coordinator Danny Gonzales implored to the media that his unit was nowhere near the standard that they are holding themselves to.

One week later, that message rings loud and clear as the Sun Devils are coming off their first loss of the season to the San Diego State Aztecs while surrendering 311 rushing yards in the process.

Gonzales’ defense as a whole had many question marks surrounding it going into the season with the linebacker room seeming to shoulder the brunt of them.

With two true freshman in Merlin Robertson and Darien Butler, a redshirt senior coming off a torn ACL in Koron Crump, a converted tight end in Jay Jay Wilson, and untested upperclassmen such as Malik Lawal and Khaylan Kearse-Thomas expected to carry such a unique and critical workload in Gonzales’ 3-3-5 scheme, there have definitely been some bright spots through three games in 2018.

Robertson was named the Walter Camp National Defensive Player of the Week following the Michigan State triumph while Butler is tied for third on the team in tackles for loss.

“I still think the two freshman, Darien and Merlin, are doing a phenomenal job for being true freshman,” Gonzales said. “Now that we’ve played a full quarter of the season, we’ll see how much of a toll this is going to take on them. We’ve played 225 snaps on defense in three games. That’s for most teams the equivalent of four games. I’m proud of where they’re at, but we’ve got to get a lot better still… they’re OK at everything, but we need to be really good at everything.”

The linebackers have a unique responsibility in the 3-3-5, needing to be able to bring pressure from the edge of the formation, drop into pass coverage, help in run support, all while not always being able to rely on the quarterback being pressured into mistakes with just three down linemen.

According to Robertson, all of the assignments and potential responsibilities on any given play aren’t the biggest adjustment he’s had to overcome at the collegiate level.

“The tempo and the speed. That’s one of the main things that surprised me, was how fast the game is,” Robertson said.

For redshirt sophomore cornerback Chase Lucas, the growing pains for any true freshman in college football is inevitable, but he sees great potential from the linebacker corps.

“I think that with [Robertson and Butler] learning this, and as the season goes on, they’re going to pick it up a little bit more, but with run stop and run support, they’re lights out,” Lucas said. “We gotta work on their drops and their coverages and stuff like that, but I think they’ll be good.”

While the overall performance of the linebackers falls under Gonzales’ direction, the coach spending the most amount of time with them on a daily basis is Antonio Pierce.

The former nine-year NFL veteran and Super Bowl XLII champion with the New York Giants brings a professional mindset to the practice fields in Tempe, and with that mindset comes brutally honest evaluations of his players coming off the loss to San Diego State.

“I think it’s a wake-up call when somebody just decides to play goal line the entire game, 22 personnel, and just hit you in the mouth,” Pierce said. “You need to realize that you got to strap it up and bring it every play. In that game it didn’t matter, they made up their mind in the second half they were just going to run the ball and we didn’t do a good job of stopping them.”

According to those that work with him on a daily basis, the experience and resumé that Pierce carries with him is invaluable with trying to get results on the field.

“All the schemes that we’re seeing and stuff that he played against in the NFL, he can give it to those guys from his view and it has a lot of credit because of how good of a player he was,” Gonzales said. “I’m super excited he’s on our staff because he does a phenomenal job.”

“He’s just made the game so much easier for us,” Robertson said. “He’s taught us good techniques on how to take on blocks and double-teams and stuff like that.”

As the Sun Devils get set to face the No. 10 Washington Huskies in Seattle for their Pac-12 opener, Pierce believes in a simple mindset to try and correct the mistakes that cost them against the Aztecs.

“Go back to day one. Training mode, grind, get them dirty, make them mad, pissed off, and then just move on,” Pierce said. “Because at the end of the day that’s one game you can’t go crazy over it. We’ll be a good defense, we got a good linebacker corps, but we just have to get back to the foundation and the roots of things.”

Bobby Kraus is a football beat writer for the Walter Cronkite Sports Network. You can follow him on Twitter @bobbykraus22