(Photo via Brendan O’Keeffe/WCSN)
Arizona State Football interim head coach Shaun Aguano picked up his first win at the helm against Washington and hopes to lead his squad to victory, which would mark consecutive wins for the first time this season.
ASU’s first conference win came in spectacular fashion as the Sun Devils upset then-No. 21 Washington. Following the win, the Sun Devils used their bye week to continue improving and preparing for their next game.
“I feel like we got a step closer to our goals simply because we didn’t take a day off,” said redshirt sophomore defensive back Ro Torrence. “We were still working at it like we had a game this past week, so it really wasn’t like a bye. I mean, we did get a little time to get some rest, but as a team, we still attacked it like it was a regular game week.”
ASU (2-4, 1-2 Pac-12) will hit the road for a match against the Stanford Cardinal (2-4, 0-4 Pac-12), which seems far less daunting on the surface, but the Sun Devils haven’t won in Stanford Stadium since 2007, and there’s no telling what the Cardinal will be able to muster up in their Homecoming week showdown.
Stanford’s two wins this season came against Colgate in week 1 and Notre Dame in Week 8. Sandwiched between were four Pac-12 losses, three of which were against ranked opponents.
Stanford’s offense hasn’t exactly been a force, contradicting its consistent scoring. The Cardinal average 26.8 points per game, tied for eighth in the Pac-12 with ASU, and 397.7 yards per game, which is also good for eighth place in the conference.
Although Stanford is known for being a run-heavy team, this year’s squad has capitalized more through the passing game, accumulating 1,596 passing yards and only 790 rushing yards.
“It’s not the regular Stanford team that everybody is used to,” Torrence said. “They’re trying to translate to a more airy offense. They really were a downhill run game. They’re trying to translate their offense to a more passing offense, so we’ve just got to go out and execute our jobs…”
Junior quarterback Tanner McKee is well on pace to surpass his numbers from last season, throwing 1,537 passing yards and ten touchdowns compared to his 2,327 yards and 15 touchdowns from 2021.
McKee’s leading pass-catcher is fifth-year wide receiver Michael Wilson. His 418 yards and four touchdowns on 26 receptions place him in the top 15 among Pac-12 receivers.
Despite putting up smaller numbers on the stat sheet, senior receiver Elijah Higgins and fifth-year receiver Brycen Tremayne play key roles in Stanford’s offense as big bodies that can create severe mismatches. Together, the two combine for another 522 receiving yards.
“We’ve got to be physical,” said junior defensive back Chris Edmonds. “We’ve got to come in and establish physicalness at the beginning of the game. They’re great at high pointing the ball and going up, jumping and getting the ball, so we’ve got to match that…They do a lot of just trying to isolate one-on-one outside, throw a lot of jump balls.”
Despite relying on the ground game less this year, the Cardinal have also produced another solid performer in the backfield. Junior running back Casey Filkins is fifth in the conference with 430 rushing yards at the season’s midway point.
Filkins’s success can be attributed to Stanford’s offensive line. They are frequently able to overwhelm opposing defenders with their size but graduate defensive lineman Nesta Jade Silvera and the defense aren’t too worried about the size up front.
“That’s a big O-line,” Silvera said. “…They’re definitely stout up front, big across the board. Their center’s probably the smaller one, but yeah, they work very good together. They’re a split zone team, stuff like that, stuff we’ve seen all year, so I look at it, as long as we do our stuff right, it really doesn’t matter who’s lined up across from us.”
The Sun Devils, who are the only defense in the Pac-12 without a fumble recovery, may be able to find the opportunity to pick up their first loose ball this weekend, as Filkins has fumbled four times.
The Cardinal defense doesn’t pose too daunting of a challenge, allowing the third-most yards per game and fourth-most points per game in the Pac-12.
This is, mostly in part, due to their run defense. Opponents are bullying Stanford in the ground game, picking up an average of 197.5 yards per game, ranking them in the bottom 15 among all FBS schools.
However, the secondary makes up for it in the passing game, allowing the second-lowest passing yards in the Pac-12 at 213.3 yards per game.
The biggest threat in the secondary is senior cornerback Kyu Blue Kelly, who has three pass breakups and no interceptions but has deflected a career-high 11 passes, which may be enough to make ASU think twice about throwing in his direction.
Even with Kelly’s reputation, graduate receiver Bryan Thompson is intent on maintaining a high level of confidence.
“[Kelly’s] patient,” Thompson said. “He’s very patient. He can be physical at times, and he likes to break on out routes and things like that, so staying disciplined is going to be a key. Staying upright, staying straight and staying disciplined with all my routes is going to be the key, but if you ask me personally, I have confidence in myself, so I don’t ever say somebody is going to get the better of me or something.”
Outside of Kelly, ASU will need to be mindful of senior edge Stephen Herron, who leads the Cardinal’s defensive front with 3.5 sacks and 4.5 tackles for losses. His ability to break into the backfield could be troublesome for an ASU offensive line that is missing its best lineman – senior offensive lineman LaDarius Henderson.
Striking similarities exist between the two programs, as both aim to reconcile their early-season struggles to cash in the six-win record needed for bowl eligibility — a feat that may be more fantasy than reality for the loser of Saturday’s matchup.
