ASU Football: Sun Devils’ growing pains continue as Camp T nears

(Photo via Alyssa Buruato/WCSN)

Arizona State Football has seemingly hit the dog days of summer, and it hit the hardest on Tuesday’s eighth preseason practice.

It was the Sun Devils’ eighth practice in the last nine days, with each one being played outside in near 100-degree heat. This was also the first training camp practice held inside the newly named Mountain America Stadium and the second in full pads, with head coach Kenny Dillingham wanting to instill “a little juice” and a game day environment.

Amidst the searing conditions, Dillingham noticed that the defensive unit was complaining about calls or plays not going its way during the 11-on-11 team scrimmages. Dillingham called the behavior “a loser mentality” with a “lot of talk, no action.”

But for the first-year head coach, this is all a part of the process towards developing his team and its culture.

“We haven’t been inside one time. We’ve had two of our hardest practices back-to-back. I’m trying to create this – this isn’t an accident,” Dillingham said following practice. “I can easily get them to come out here and never complain because I would never put them in a situation to have conflict. We talk about response and you can only respond if there’s adversity. Our job is to create that adversity, and part of coming in here and doing a scrimmage (and) having a long practice is creating the adversity necessary to where that stuff does not show up on game day. Because that would be embarrassing.”

Redshirt junior linebacker Will Shaffer also recognized his peers’ gripes on Tuesday. The fourth-year Sun Devil spoke from experience in saying the adversity will help the squad in the long run.

“We’re all just competitive, we all want to win. We all want to be the best but we got to go about it a different way and today was not the way that we’re supposed to go about it,” Shaffer said. “When we get to Saturday nights, when we face that adversity, we got to stick together. We got to band together because it’s not always going to go good.”

The Sun Devils experienced even more adversity this past week when it was announced that Tennessee transfer linebacker Juwan Mitchell and sophomore cornerback Isaiah Johnson were dismissed from the team. Mitchell was expected to make an immediate impact upon his arrival, while Johnson flashed his potential as a freshman last season.

Both moves are telling of Dillingham’s persistent desire to build a sturdy foundation and culture for the program.

“I believe that’s a great first starting base for a team,” Shaffer said. “Especially a new team, new coaches, a lot of new players. If you don’t have that culture you don’t have anything.”

Shaffer also added that the leaders and more experienced Sun Devils – throwing himself in the mix – have to embrace this culture for the younger Sun Devils to follow suit.

ASU will continue developing good habits and a team bond at Camp Tontozona in Payson from Aug. 10-12. The Sun Devils will practice and scrimmage at the iconic facility up north for the first time since 2019, one of Dillingham’s goals upon being hired at his alma mater last November.

“Really just going up there and guys hanging out,” Dillingham said, when asked what he was looking forward to at the camp. “Culture wins. I firmly believe in it. You have to go through personal adversity here (in Tempe), you have to go through personal adversity of ‘Camp T’ without cell phones. You have to go through that in order to harden yourself to be able to overcome situations.”

Without cell phones, Shaffer said he’s excited to potentially play cards, “Uno” and “Monopoly” with his teammates. Tontozona is also an opportunity for the linebacker to connect beyond position groups.

“I could mesh with a receiver or mesh with running backs because we don’t really see each other on a daily basis. So that gives the time for everybody to get out of their bubble, get out of their barrier, and just interact and have a good time.”

Camp T will come off the heels of consecutive practices that have left Dillingham less than satisfied. He said that the defense consistently got the better of the offense on Monday, while the performances were flipped on Tuesday.

While the camp provides a change of scenery, it is still part of the Sun Devils’ draining clog of upcoming preseason practices. Dillingham is prepared to challenge his unit with adversity to a certain extent and give it much-needed rest before opening the season against Southern Utah on Aug. 31.

“I think we have a good plan later when we get through this weight of 15-16 days, to when we tone off of them,” Dillingham said. “I know it’s four real practices in the last 14 days leading up to the game. We have some walkthroughs (and) we have some joggers in there, but they’re going to be able to get their legs back before we start the marathon.”