(Photo: Rebecca Striffler/WCSN)
Arizona State Football and Utah both came into Saturday night’s matchup undefeated in Pac-12 Conference play. The Sun Devils had been playing solid football for weeks, with big wins over UCLA and Stanford. Meanwhile, the Utes had just come off a huge blowout win over USC.
The stage was set. However, the stage seemed all too familiar and began to look like a recurring nightmare the Sun Devils experienced earlier in the season when it last traveled to the state to the north. With a loud crowd at Rice-Eccles Stadium combined with the eight penalties before halftime, the game on Saturday night for ASU began to resemble the loss against BYU in Week 3.
The argument can be made that the 35-21 loss to Utah on Saturday was worse than the 27-17 loss to BYU because so much was at stake for the Sun Devils. ASU had an opportunity to almost certainly secure their place in the Pac-12 Championship game and play for a chance to make the Rose Bowl Game in Pasadena.
All of that is in the air now.
“Lots of football left,” ASU head coach Herm Edwards said postgame. “We don’t control our destiny as much as we had before.”
The Sun Devils looked polished on both ends of the ball in the first half as ASU led the Utes 21-7. Senior linebacker Darien Butler and junior defensive back Kejuan Markham each had an interception. Tight ends Jalin Conyers, a redshirt freshman, and Curtis Hodges, a senior, combined for five catches, 55 yards and two touchdowns.
Conyers got the Sun Devils on the board first after Utah blew a coverage in the end zone. The tight end earned his first career touchdown and first multi-catch game on Saturday night.
Nevertheless, the second half for ASU was painful. Utah scored touchdowns on all four of its possessions in the second half. The Utes had 285 total second half yards, compared to the Sun Devils’ measly 97.
“We just fell into the trap of not gaining momentum on either side of the ball,” Edwards said.
Through its first six games of the season, ASU had allowed a total of 26 second half points. On Saturday night, Utah was able to score 28 second half points against the Sun Devils.
Despite the stunning contrast, the pieces as to how it happened do fall in line with one another.
Both ASU junior quarterback Jayden Daniels and Utah sophomore quarterback Cameron Rising posed a threat to the opposing defensive units. Once Edwards’ unit stopped putting lots of pressure on Rising, he was able to settle in and lead the Utes to an exciting comeback win in the second half. Rising ended the night completing 21 of his 33 pass attempts for 247 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions.
Utah was also able to generate a run game in the second half, earning 145 of its 208 rushing yards after halftime.
The Utes limited Daniels’ dual threat ability and kept him in the pocket in the second half, where Daniels was sacked a total of four times.
The question about ASU’s wide receivers rose again on Saturday night. Without redshirt freshman wide receiver Johnny Wilson, the Sun Devils’ corps were seemingly absent after the group produced big outings in previous weeks.
ASU’s only passing touchdowns of the evening were caught by tight ends.
“Offensively, we couldn’t move the ball,” Edwards said.
On the bright side for the Sun Devils is that a bye week is on the horizon. But whether that provides ASU time to recover and come back stronger from Saturday’s loss or time to dwell on it remains to be seen.
