Weathering the storm pays dividends for ASU in a bounceback performance

(Photo: Spencer Barnes/ WCSN)

TEMPE — A proven tenant in the sports world is that an initial defeat often doesn’t define who a team is; it’s how they respond afterwards. Coming off a brutal last-second defeat at Mississippi State the weekend prior, alarm bells were ringing awfully early for an Arizona State football team chasing another conference title and a return to the postseason.

Despite the Sun Devils dropping out of the AP top 25 poll with major question marks on both sides of the ball, ASU head coach Kenny Dillingham insisted to the media on Monday that his focus lay on not overreacting after one loss. One final non-conference game remained on the schedule, and with more pressure than ever, his team needed to prove that the stunner in Starkville was nothing more than a minor setback

In front of another sellout crowd at Mountain America Stadium, Arizona State (2-1) looked the part as strong play across the board proved to be enough to take down Texas State (2-1) 34-15 on Saturday night.

“I thought we had good energy all night,” head coach Kenny Dillingham said. “I think that was one of the things I was pleased with is I think we carried over the second half of last week in terms of energy and the passion and how we played with on both sides of the ball into this week.”

It’s hard to argue that any player needed to rebound more than redshirt sophomore quarterback Sam Leavitt after going 10-for-22 for 82 yards and throwing two interceptions against Mississippi State. Back home, he delivered a performance reminiscent of his normal level of play.

Through the air, Leavitt completed 15 passes on 25 attempts for 188 yards and two touchdowns. In addition, he rushed for 59 yards on 12 rushing attempts. However, that doesn’t tell the full story of how his athleticism and ability to extend plays played a significant role throughout the game.

The perfect example came in the form of Leavitt escaping a collapsing pocket before throwing a floater off one leg to redshirt junior wide receiver Jordyn Tyson for a 30-yard highlight-reel touchdown to give ASU a 10-3 lead at the start of the second quarter.

“They brought double soft pressure, we were going to go out to it,” Leavitt said. “We kind of had a miscommunication on the protection, and I knew (Jordyn Tyson) was going to get to a spot. We talked about all week about it. I was kind of high low off the flight defender out there. Toss my back, kind of just made a play, knew where he was going to be. I just got him the ball and then he made a hell of a play.”

Just like the last time he touched the field in Tempe, Tyson put on a show with 106 yards and a touchdown on six receptions. Unlike the season opener however, the Sun Devils spread out the production in the passing game to multiple targets. The main benefactor was redshirt senior tight end Chamon Metayer who recorded a career-high six catches for 60 yards and a touchdown on a 27-yard screen down the left sideline.

“Chamon’s just been a soldier for us the first few games, and not many targets,” Dillingham said. “He’s just gone to work, and I said, you’ve got to reward people that just work like that and block like that.”

One constant that the ASU offense relied upon for a third straight week came in the backfield. With junior running back Kyson Brown being unable to dress for the game due to injury, redshirt junior running back Raleek Brown took the opportunity for the extra spotlight and turned in his best performance as a Sun Devil yet.

His 144 rushing yards on 12 attempts in addition to one catch for 11 yards put him 22 yards shy of matching his total yards tally through the first two games of the season. The highlight of his night came in the form of turning a burst through a wide-open running lane into a track race that ended in a 75-yard dagger touchdown just before the end of the third quarter.

“I think he was just so hurt from, same as what I was in, hurt from knee injury, had knee surgery,” Tyson said. “Just not being able to play, seeing all your brothers play, seeing us lose in the college football playoff. You just develop this hunger of just wanting to come back better than ever, and that’s what he did.”

ASU’s defense also didn’t squander the chance to exit the non-conference slate on a relative high note. While still allowing 303 yards of offense and 7.4 yards per completion, the Bobcats’ 29 minutes of possession only resulted in two touchdowns in the last 18 minutes of play thanks to the Sun Devils coming up with a stop 13 times on 22 combined third-and-fourth down attempts.

In particular, the pass rush and secondary stepped up in a big way after allowing 279 passing yards the game prior. ASU almost eclipsed its season-long sack total in one night with five sacks coming from five different players.

One of those came courtesy of senior linebacker Jordan Crook who exploded for an additional seven solo tackles, 3.5 tackles for loss, and a final tally of 12 tackles. He now leads the team in tackles with 24 so far.

“I think once we realized that all week the focus was come out here and get back to the playing our type of ball, I feel like we went out there and did that tonight,” Crook said.

Another undisputed standout was redshirt sophomore safety Adrian “Boogie” Wilson. The Washington State transfer went from being inserted into the starting lineup on short notice as a result of an injury to redshirt senior Xavion Alford to matching a career best of seven total tackles, six of them solo, to add a much-needed layer of physicality to the backfield.

“Crook was the first person to text me,” Wilson said. “It said, ‘Lock in, it’s time now. You’re here.’ So for me, it was just playing for them, and they believed in me.”

The Sun Devils did their part to ensure they didn’t let the opportunity to establish much-needed momentum following a heartbreaking finish pass them by in all three phases.

Such a performance couldn’t have come at a better time since the unpredictable gauntlet of Big 12 play is now just a week away, starting with a road trip to Waco, Texas for a matchup against the Baylor Bears.

“I think we’re slowly figuring ourselves out, and I think every team, I continue to say this, you want to get better and you want to learn more and adapt to your team as the season progresses,” Dillingham said. “If you’re firing on all cylinders in week one, there’s probably going to be a bump in the road. People are probably going to try to eventually figure it out. You’d love to do that, but the goal is to get better and better and better.

“I think we’ve gotten better even in last week’s loss. I thought we got better in that second half, and I think in this week, we got better because that’s a good football team. The goal next week is to get better again because we face another good football team, and rock and roll.”