(Photo: Marina Williams/WCSN)
ATLANTA– It is a play that will be remembered forever, living on in infamy in the minds of the Sun Devil faithful. After erasing a 16-point second-half Texas lead, Arizona State football was in the driver’s seat with the opportunity to steer themselves into the College Football Playoff Semifinal.
Up 31-24 in the first overtime period, ASU had Texas dead to rights on fourth down and needing 13 yards to keep the Longhorns’ lofty hopes alive. Defensive coordinator Brian Ward dialed up a cover zero look, sending everything they had at Texas junior quarterback Quinn Ewers, hoping to get to him before he could torch ASU’s man coverage defense.
They didn’t. They didn’t even come close. Ewers checked into max protection, snapped the ball, and found junior wide receiver Matthew Golden wide open in the end zone after fooling ASU senior defensive back Shamari Simmons. Simmons bit on an out-breaking route and couldn’t catch up as Golden brought in his second touchdown of the day, keeping Texas alive.
On the first play of double overtime, Ewers found his man again, hitting Gunnar Helm for a 25-yard touchdown and converting the two-point conversion. ASU (11-3) couldn’t answer as redshirt freshman quarterback Sam Leavitt’s pass was picked off, resulting in a 39-31 Texas (13-2) win and ending the Sun Devil’s unbelievable season.
“I didn’t have the ability to get out of (the cover zero call), and that’s on me,” ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham said. “We left our guys isolated in cover zero into max protection. I got to go into that game with an ability to get out of that call.”
Wednesday was a microcosm of ASU’s historic 2024 season. Already being counted out prior to kickoff, the Sun Devils didn’t do themselves any favors by going down 14-3 early, especially as ASU’s special teams gifted the Longhorns seven points on a 75-yard house call from senior returner Silas Bolden.
So after being counted out pregame, with Texas being favored by as much as two touchdowns on some sportsbooks, ASU spotted the Longhorns a 14-point lead before it felt like the game really got going. At that point it had to be over for ASU against the far more talented Texas team, right?
Well, the Sun Devils did what all the great Arizona State students do. They puked and rallied, literally.
As the third quarter was coming to an end, senior running back Cam Skattebo began rotating a lot more frequently with backup sophomore running back Kyson Brown; ESPN’s Taylor McGregor revealed that Skattebo was ‘violently throwing up on the sideline.’
“I threw up. I drank too much water, too fast, and I was kind of feeling sloshy, and then felt better after,” Skattebo said.
Feeling better is an understatement.
With ASU down 24-8 and needing two touchdowns and two two-point conversions to have any hope, Skattebo took over. On fourth-and-2 with under seven minutes left and his team’s season on the line, Skattebo took it back to 2023, where he was ASU’s do-everything man, catching a pitch from Leavitt and throwing it to senior receiver Malik McClain 42 yards downfield, touchdown.
ASU converted the two-point conversion. One-score game.
Redshirt sophomore Javan Robinson athletically picked off Ewers’ post throw on the next Texas drive, and ASU was in a position to drive down the field and tie the game. Immediately as they got the ball back, Leavitt looked to one man streaking down the sideline one-on-one with a linebacker. Skattebo hauled it in 62 yards later, putting ASU inside the 10.
He, of course, scored and converted the two-point conversion, taking the score from 24-8 to 24-24 in just five minutes of game time.
“He’s a special player; he’s somebody,” Dillingham said. “That’s just Cam. It’s exactly what I expected, the bottom line. When you give him the ball, crazy things happen.”
Skattebo added another score in overtime to give a legendary final statline. 30 rushes for 143 yards and two touchdowns. Eight receptions for 99 yards, 42 passing yards and a touchdown. He leaves the field as ASU’s single-season program record holder in rushing yards (1,711), scrimmage yards (2,316), and total touchdowns (24).
Despite the losing effort, Skattebo earned the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Offensive MVP, becoming the first losing player to win the award in 17 years.
Skattebo’s puke and rally game was the final performance in a legendary ASU career, one that has vaulted him to a special tier of Sun Devil.
“ASU has changed my life forever, in a good way, simple,” Skattebo said. “They’ve supported me through everything, put me in a position to be successful. I thank everybody in the ASU community. … They changed my life forever.”
ASU might have changed Skattebo forever, but he did his part to change ASU for the better, too. Entering the program in a time of major change, Skattebo became the engine of the Sun Devil steam train.
In year one, he was ASU’s only answer to any problem, using him to run, catch, throw and punt. In year two, he was the face of a team that defied all odds and maxed out its potential. The Sun Devils went as Skattebo went, and now they must go on without him. But they have a couple of special pieces in place to make that transition.
“Coach Dillingham’s got the longest future of any coach in history, I promise, and then, this kid next to me, he’s gonna play on Sundays,” Skattebo said with an emotional Dillingham and Leavitt sitting next to him. “I’m gonna play on Sundays. Us three right here, we got a long life ahead of us. This is just the beginning for us. No matter what, these guys will be in my life forever.”
ASU was one play away from shocking the college football world once again and knocking off Texas. That fourth-and-13 will haunt the minds of Sun Devil fans forever, but as heartbreaking as that Golden touchdown was, the 2024 season was just as memorable and fulfilling as the blown coverage was devastating.
Arizona State has been eliminated from the quarterfinal round of the College Football Playoff in a double-overtime heartbreaker to Steve Sarkisian’s Longhorns. What a sentence that would have been to read in August.
“I think a lot of people were questioning (if we belonged on the field), and I don’t think any person questions if we belonged on the field now,” Dillingham said. “There are no moral victories when the season ends. There’s no such thing. This should hurt. This should be painful. The locker room is dreadful right now, and it should be. If it wasn’t, something would be wrong.
“But at the same token, now that this is over, I really am going to challenge our guys to reflect on where it all started because it is remarkable.”
