Raleek Brown breaks records and reaches milestones as he leads ASU to victory

(Photo: Courtesy Sun Devil Athletics)

Raleek Brown knew he was going to make up for his blunder. Arizona State’s redshirt junior running back was sure of it.

“I told everybody I was going to get a touchdown the next possession,” Brown said in a conversation with his team after his fumble. “It happened on the first play.”

As time was expiring at the end of the third quarter, the Sun Devil was rushing up the middle for a first down and more. Brown wasn’t home free, though; he had two Colorado defenders in front of him. To try to avoid the adversaries, Brown took to the air.

It proved to be a bad decision.

Brown had gained 20 yards, but he had also lost the football, and the Buffs corralled the fumble. Luckily for Brown and the Sun Devils, Colorado’s only response was a fumble of its own, setting the running back up for redemption.

On first-and-10 from his team’s own 12-yard line, Brown received a handoff from quarterback Jeff Sims and made the most of it. He bided his time in the backfield, waiting for a hole to open, and when one did, he attacked it.

Brown exploded through the middle of the field, merging toward the right sideline as he flew past yard markers. When he was stopped by a Buffaloes defender, it was too late.

“I just seen a big hole, and just burst through it,” Brown said. “I followed the pullers and just seen it and burst, and nobody was back there.”

The 88-yard touchdown – which is ASU’s longest play of the season so far – was just one of a handful of impressive feats for Brown on Saturday night. Arizona State (8-3, 6-2 Big 12) was able to ride its explosiveness to a 42-17 victory over Colorado, escaping the harsh conditions of Folsom Field with a mathematical chance to make the Big 12 Championship.

“(Brown) played great,” ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham said. “O-line played phenomenal in the second half. When we started getting the right hats on the right hats, we started moving people. The running backs saw the holes, and he played phenomenal in the second half.”

The 88-yard touchdown had awoken the beast that is the Sun Devils rushing attack. Through three quarters, the team posted a very respectable 150 yards on the ground, but cleared that figure and then some in the fourth quarter with 205 rushing yards.

The offense had gotten clogged up and bogged down by turnovers through the first three quarters, managing to post just 21 points despite seeming to move the ball well on paper. The difference was the gaps created by the offensive line, and Brown and his fellow running backs’ ability to hit them.

“We haven’t been very good at gap early this year, but we got in rhythm with them,” Dillingham said. “When you can run the football, the game is easy. If you can run the ball and stop the run, you’re going to win 90% of your games, if not more.”

The Buffs entered Saturday night’s game with one of the worst rushing defenses in the country, allowing 200 or more rushing yards to six different opponents and a Big 12-worst 210 rushing yards allowed per game.

It took some time for Brown to show his explosiveness against them, but once he did, it led to two more run-heavy drives that ended in pay dirt for junior and redshirt freshman running backs Kanye Udoh and Jason Brown Jr, driving the score up 42.

“They were playing man (coverage),” Brown said. “Once you get past the second level, ain’t nobody there really.”

Brown didn’t just kick off ASU’s late flurry; he started the team’s touchdown scoring in the second quarter.

On fourth-and-2 from Colorado’s 33-yard line, Dillingham decided to be aggressive and go for it. The Sun Devils drew up a wheel route for Brown, and he found himself open for a 33-yard touchdown reception.

The touchdown catch was the only ball that Brown would haul in through the air, doing the rest of his damage on the ground.

After rushing for just 16 yards in the first quarter, he recorded 92 in the second, including an impressive 59-yard run, which helped set up a 39-yard field goal for redshirt senior Jesus Gomez. He continued to run for 30 yards in the third, putting him on the doorstep of history.

Then, he broke loose for his 88-yard touchdown, creating game and career milestones.

Brown went from 138 rushing yards to 226, breaking his former career high of 144 yards. He then extended his new career high by adding 29 yards on three more carries after his touchdown before checking out of the game, giving him a total of 255 rushing yards on the day.

The 255 rushing yards, combined with the 33 receiving yards, meant he became the first Power Four running back with 240 or more rushing yards and 30 or more receiving yards since the Sun Devils very own Cam Skattebo had 262 and 35 against Mississippi State last season.

It also meant that he broke Ben Malone’s record for rushing yards in an away game by a Sun Devil, which he set in 1973 against Oregon State with 251.

On an even bigger scale, Brown’s 255 rushing yards thrust him over the coveted 1,000 rushing yards in a season barrier, with 1,078.

Postgame, Brown didn’t exactly know how he was going to celebrate the feat, but he knew how he felt.

“It feels good,” Brown said. “I ain’t had a 1,000-yard rushing (season) since Mater Dei (High School).”

ASU running backs coach Shaun Aguano has had a 1,000-yard rusher in six of the last seven seasons, not including the pandemic-shortened 2020. Now, Brown has officially joined that list, which he shares with Eno Benjamin, Rashaad White, Xazavian Valladay, and Cam Skattebo.

“Coach Aguano’s awesome,” Dillingham said. “When you’re a (high school) head coach and you’re winning state championships and you’re known as the best head coach in the state for a long time, and then you get to coach five guys, you’re going to be pretty good at it. … He gets to focus on five guys, he gets to pour into them, and they’ve had great results.”