By the skin of their teeth and thanks to two critical drives in the second half, Arizona State Sun Devils football fought through adversity and hung on to take down the Mississippi State Bulldogs football program. The Sun Devils got their first win over an SEC team, but that's not remotely the story here. No, the story of this game was Kenny Dillingham and the Sun Devils held on to win a close game after dominating the first half. The team admitted they got comfortable while Mississippi State made halftime adjustments and got back into this game. But unlike the Arizona State Sun Devil football team we saw last season, this team held strong to pull out a tight win. Simply put, the Sun Devils didn't know how to win football games last year. They've proven that won't be the case in 2024. The Sun Devils ran the ball for over 350 yards and dialed up another strong defensive performance. Despite getting comfortable and letting off the gas in the second half, the team responded when hey needed to and got a tough and well-earned win and now the 2024 Arizona State Sun Devils football program is off to a 2-0 start. Host Richie Bradshaw breaks down the win including the good and the bad with some key takeaways before closing the show by handing out three game balls on this edition of the Locked On Sun Devils podcast.
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[MUSIC PLAYING] You are locked on Sun Devils, your daily podcast on the Arizona State Sun Devils, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team, every day. Welcome back to the Locked On Sun Devils podcast, part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team, every day. My name is Richie Bradshaw, and I will be your guide for everything Arizona State Sun Devils. A special shout out to my every dayers who are here every day. And thank you for making us your first listen of the day. Don't forget to hit subscribe, hit like, and turn on notifications wherever you get your shows. Stay in touch by following me on Twitter @RitchieBrad36. The podcast at LO underscores Sun Devils. Do me a favor. If you have not hit subscribe on YouTube yet, do me that solid. Let's hit subscribe. We are 75 followers away from 1,000, the best fan base in the world, the most reliable. And once we hit that number, I promise, we're going to find a way to celebrate together as a channel. Today's episode is brought to you by 5-Hour Energy. Go to 5hourenergy.com. That's the number 5hourenergy.com, use my promo code locked on CFP and get 20% off of your order. Ladies and gentlemen, happy victory Sunday. Yeah, that's right. We cannot wait for Monday. And I don't know moving forward if we're going to be able to wait until Monday for these episodes. So TBD, but at least for today, we're going for Sunday, especially because we have a really packed week ahead of us. ASU is playing again on Thursday night, first road game of the year against Texas State. So we got a lot to get through before we get to that show. So again, now has never been a better time to subscribe as we update you on games, as we prepare for games, and as we recap games. Speaking of recap, let's go ahead and talk about last night's game against Mississippi State, because this was a hell of a game from start to finish. We're going to talk about the good that came out of this show, or that came out of the game, excuse me, to start the show. There was one massive, massive strength in this game. It was a run game. This Arizona State Sun Devil's run game was rampant, which not a surprise after they killed it in week one against Wyoming, but if you thought that week one was good, week two was even better. 359 rushing yards from this team on 54 carries. That is insane. That is-- I'm pulling it up right now. That is 6.6 yards per carry for the team. Sam Levitt had 68 rushing yards. Also took a-- was it a 14-yard sack or something like that? Nah, it wasn't that big. Whatever it was, he was over 70 rushing yards. The Carlos Brooks added 24 rushing yards of his own. Tyson Brown added five on two carries, but the story of the game, ladies and gentlemen, was Cameron Scataboo, who put this team on his back. 33 carries, 262 yards along of 39. It was chunk plays tonight, last night, I should say. It felt like every single time he touched the football, he was getting a first down. It was 70 yards, eight yards, 12 yards, 15 yards. And then to end the game, one of the most selfless actions I have seen from the Sun Devils in years. Scataboo breaks it off to convert a third and short for ASU, a game ceiling play. Big run down the sidelines, has a chance to score, but you know what he does? He slides down. Cameron Scataboo has a chance to score what probably would have been like a 50 yard touchdown. Sandals for 39 yards, slides down. And of course, he hits them with the little cross arm, like, yeah, what are you going to do about it? I am too good for this team. Mississippi State, that is. They couldn't stop him. The second most rushing yards in a game in Sun Devils history, if you know number one, leave a comment and let me know who that guy was. When it happened, it was pretty special. I'll give you a hint, it was back in 2018. So if you go back and take a look, you will find the number one rushing game. But Scataboo, 33 carries, man. They put the game in his hands of 54 team carries. And 53, if you do not include that Sam Levitt sack. He took 33 of them. And it was-- it was-- it was nuts, man. Like, there's no other way to describe it. Almost eight yards per carry, 7.9 yards per carry in this game. For one, it's worth-- he also caught three passes for 35 yards, which was the highest receiving total in the game. We'll talk about the passing game later on in the show. Running game, beyond exceptional. This is one of the best running games in the country. They have already run it 106 times in two games. 587 yards, 5.5 a pot, excuse me, four touchdowns. One from Scataboo, one from Books. And Sam Levitt found the end zone twice in this game, including the first score, where he just takes it to the left side of the field. And in a foot race, makes it dive for the end zone and hits the pile on. Outstanding truly a dual threat quarterback. I didn't see this coming. We talked in the off season about how he is a better athlete than people give him credit for. And he's going to do a really good job extending plays and breaking out of the pocket. One of the things we did not talk about on this show was his ability to beat you as a runner. 19 carries 115 yards, 6.1 yards per carry on the year, with three sacks for a loss of 18 yards. Ladies and gentlemen, Sam Levitt is a dual threat in this game. They have the depth, the Carlos Brooks and Tyson Brown, who didn't get very many carries in this game, but they're still more than exceptional players. It also starts with the offensive line, who, excuse my language, absolutely kicked ass against Mississippi State. That was, again, it was an ass woman. It was good old fashioned. Take you behind the woodyard, the barn, I can't remember the phrase. And they just went crazy on them. You don't run for 300 yards without having great blocking. And up front, they just dominated the trenches. They gave up a single sack. For the most part, they were able to control the pocket. Of course, there was some pressure, but I mean, this is still a really good offensive line. They are playing up to the status, the potential and the standard that we gave for them going into the year with all the depth that they have. They have lived up to the hype. They're too deep. They are terrific run blockers. They have done more than a good enough job for Sam Levitt as a past blocking team. And they are allowing him to be able to get creative, break the pocket. You don't run the way that he has run without giving him those opportunities. It's exceptional what they do. Looking at the defense, Brian Ward, a guru, I said last week, I'll echo it again. He is going to get calls this offseason to be a head coach. ASU has to do whatever they can to keep him in Tempe because what he's doing this year is special. They had, as a team, I have it down here, they had 298 yards on the game. In the first half, they only had 84 total yards. They had negative rushing yards at the end of the first half. ASU is dominating the trenches right now. The defensive tackle play of CJ fight, of Jacob Rich Congaika, of Zach Swanson, terrific. They didn't have Jeff Clark in this game, and yet they were still able to step up, have that three-man rotation and kill it. By the way, all three of them at some point in time left the field due to injury. They were able to play through it, and they played well. But in the second half, you could tell that they weren't 100%. linebacker play, really good again. Keishan Elliott got his first sack of the year. Zyris Fiesseo was, what's that end up being? Tied for fourth on the team with tackles. He was able to get into the backfield one time for loss. He split a tackle for loss. Great play from the linebackers. In the secondary, I thought they had a solid game, especially in the first half. They going, Blake Schapen is good, man. We were, no, it wasn't a secret. Going into this Mississippi State game, that the Bulldogs quarterback Blake Schapen was going to be a problem. And finding a way to contain him was going to be difficult. He goes 18 to 28 for 260 yards to touchdowns, which included an 80 yard touchdown pass to Kevin Coleman, which put it within a one score game. It was absolutely terrifying when he was able to take advantage. They were able to bring him down three times though. You had three sacks in this game. You should have had four, but they ruled Clayton Smith's takedown where he forced the fumble as a negative run because he was right near the sidelines. And I just shaped it made a huge mistake, man. Sometimes you just need to take the loss. He's just trying to do too much. He attempts to throw the ball, he ends up barely, like it just falls out of his hand. CJ fight right there scoops it up. Ballerina walks his way into the end zone. I mean, the balance that he had to stay up. He extended the ball out. You're sitting there, you're like, that's not a detackle. That's a freaking tight end or something. He got that big man touchdown. ASU's third defensive touchdown on the air, mind you, they have forced four turnovers this year through two games. It took them until their fourth game last year to force a turnover defense as nuts right now. Miles Rouser want to shout him out. One of the best players on this defense, he's all over the field, led the team in tackles again with 10, four of them solo, gonna half tackle, or yeah, half tackle for loss. Shimari Simmons, phenomenal in the slot. Seven more tackles for solo, got himself a full tackle for loss. Zabion Alford, six tackles, one solo. Your top three tacklers on this team were three safeties with Simmons dominating the slot. They are, they're doing so good. Javen Robinson had some good coverage in this game. Keith Abney had some good coverage in this game. They were playing without L.T. Welsh too. So down one of your top three corners, these guys stepped up. It's insane. How great this defense has played this year. And we sent all off season. This defense was better than giving credit for. Last year, they were better than the statistics that we saw. They played tough, they were just left on the field a lot. Well, guess what? Now that the offense is able to pick up their slack, the defense is gonna kill it. They absolutely limit, or yeah, no. I can't think of what I wanna say. Limited, there we go. It's not that hard, Richie. They limited everything Mississippi State wanted to do when the first half, they couldn't run it, they couldn't pass it, they couldn't keep shaping up right. Second half, Mississippi State made adjustments, man. Like call it as it is, Mississippi State was absolutely a completely different team in the second half. We're gonna talk about what happened in the second half and why ASU has a lot of work to do if they wanna be better moving forward in just a moment. This is the Lockdown Sonables podcast, part of the Lockdown podcast network, your team every day. If you are tired after lunch, don't worry, we all are, but the good news is five hour energy fixes tired fast. So whether you have a long list of work to do or a list of DIY projects, take a five hour energy shot. So you can check everything off your list. 'Cause if you're like me, you always have a large list of projects for your home when you get supplies for the projects and you don't forget the most essential supply, which is that five hour energy shot with zero sugar and a convenient portable size, it's the perfect pick-me-up for getting stuff done. Five hour energy website has a ton of flavors, including watermelon, tropical burst, grape, berry, and more. There's a flavor for everyone. Try 'em all on the site. You have the option to build your own 12-pack or 24-pack and it's gonna be delivered right to your door. If you go to fivehourenergy.com, that's the number five hourenergy.com. Get some five hour energy product today. You can use my promo code. Locked on CFB. To receive 20% off your order, keep in mind, this offer is only valid 'til September 30th on one order and cannot be used with other promotions. The code is not good on subscription orders. Again, go to fivehourenergy.com. That's a number five. Energy.com, build that 12-pack, build that 24-pack. Use my promo code. Locked on CFB. Get 20% off your order. Go to fivehourenergy.com today. - You know, we love talking stats here at Locked On. Here's one that's super simple to remember. Discover automatically doubles the cashback you've earned on your credit card at the end of your first year with cashback match. That means with Discover, you could turn $150 cashback to $300. That's right, you could put it towards some memorabilia you've had your eye on or treat yourself to a premium sports network. You earn and discover doubles. See terms at discover.com/creditcard. Wherever you get your shows, hit like, hit subscribe. Turn on notifications so you get that update when we post new content. A special shout out to my every dayers. I appreciate you guys more than you know. Thanks for making us your first listen of the day. And I apologize for my alarm going off in the middle of that last ad read. So thanks for sticking around for that. While we talk to you about five hour energy. By the way, if you're really tired during the day, go to five hour energy, use my promo code locked on CFB. Build your 12 pack, build your 24 pack tons of flavors, get yourself through the day. I know you're tired, I'm tired. We're gonna talk about the bad that came out of this game. And there was, there was a lull in this game for the Sun Devils. There was absolutely a lot of work to be done in the second half and it starts with finding a way to play a full 60 minutes. ASU got really comfortable in the second half. They said as much, the players said it in post game conference, we got comfortable. Kenny Doingham said in post game conference, we got comfortable. This team was doing so well in the first half. They were dominating on defense. They did whatever they want in the ground game. They controlled the time of possession battle in this game. Over 40 minutes time of possession. When you run the football like they do and your defense is getting stops like they do, typically you're gonna win that. However, this game quickly got out of hand. ASU blew a huge lead that they built up in the first half. They were up 27 to three in the second half. And they blew it. They allowed 20 points in the second half. They only scored three. This ends up being a seven point game for a team that was up three possessions. And I'm not saying you shouldn't have won by three possessions, but you should have won a little more comfortably than this. It shouldn't have been a seven point game. Should have been a 10 point game, which by the way is when I predicted, but that wasn't to be. ASU has got to play better. They have got to play a full 60 minutes because when you get comfortable, this is the stuff that happens. You played a very quality team in Mississippi State. They might not be Georgia. They might not be Alabama, but they are not one of the bottom dwellers in the SEC. This is a very, very quality football team. And they showed it in the second half. They showed why you cannot count them out and that they have the talent to be able to get back into games. Again, Blake Schapen, he's a monster, dude. He is an absolute problem for the SEC this year as long as he is able to stay healthy and man the quarterback position. And as he gets more comfortable with the Bulldogs, they're gonna be a good team. That is a team that's bowling this year for sure. So a statement went from the Sun Devils. However, this was almost not to be. They got way too comfortable in this game. Like you can't emphasize that enough. This team can't let that happen. This, you're gonna lose football games. When you go up against your Utahs, you go up against Oklahoma State, you go up against Kansas State, you start playing like that, you're gonna lose games. It doesn't matter if you have a 24-point lead. They blew it. They blew it. That can't happen. 14, that is blowing away all of college football this year and shattering the expectations that were handed out. 14, that was picked to finish dead last in the Big 12. 16th in the Big 12. You are in one of the top half teams in this conference right now. But you're not gonna be able to maintain that status if you can't play 60 minutes. You also, you are one dimensional offense, man. Again, we gotta call it as it is. They can run the heck out of the football. They cannot pass it right now. Sam Levitt was just 10 of 20 in this game for 69 yards. So under four yards per attempt, under seven yards per completion, the longest completion of the game, by the way, was Camp Skannaboo for 21 yards. 21 of Sam Levitt's 69 passing yards. So almost a third of Sam Levitt's passing yards came on one play. That can't happen. Sam Levitt could not connect on the deep ball. And look, that's going to take time. Connecting on the deep ball is not an easy thing for Wrenchher quarterback who just played his six career game and had his second career start with a new program after playing somewhere else last year. It's gonna take time. I don't know if we're gonna see the deep ball for the next two games. Hopefully, when you get to your bye week, you can really build on that. But coming up with Texas State and Texas Tech, I just don't know the ASU was going to be ready for the deep ball. And that's a problem because when Mississippi State started making their comeback, ASU got one dimensional. And they got to the point where Mississippi State is stacking the mocks and they're telling the offense, they're like, throw it, throw the football. That's the only way you're gonna beat us right now. We see that you're gonna give Skannaboo the ball three straight plays and we're gonna stuff them. Instead of those nine to 10 yard pickups, he was getting in the first quarter, the first or the second quarter, the first half, suddenly he's like three yards a carry for the third quarter. They stuffed the line. It's like, what are you supposed to do when you get your offense taken away from you? And it's not a surprise that the Sun Devils were blowing this lead now and the defense was getting tired because they're getting right back on the field. It's what we saw last year, back to back three and outs for this team and Mississippi State made them pay. Ultimately, the Sun Devils came up clutch when it mattered and we'll talk about that at the end of the podcast. However, when you play those top teams and you can't get your offense to be a balanced attack, you're gonna lose games, ASU got predictable. Mississippi State made the adjustments in the run game. They almost pulled this thing off with ASU unable to throw the football through the first two games of the year. CM Levitt was very quality, week one, by the way, but there was a lot to be desired. There was a lot left on the table against the Cowboys and you saw it this week against the Mississippi State. Credit again to the Bulldogs, that's a more than quality defense. But it was a defense that ASU was able to manhandle for the most part with over 400 yards in total offense, but 300 of it, over 300 of those yards came on the ground. Less than 70 passing yards, well less than 100 passing yards. You can't do that. And opposing teams are gonna start getting film on the Sun Devils and they're gonna go, these are the tendencies that they like to do with the run game. This is how they like to run Cameron's Gotaboo. This is how CM Levitt breaks out of the pocket. We're going to be able to contain those things and we're gonna hold ASU's offense well under control because we're gonna test them to throw the football. Now, Kenny Dillingham did say post-conference. He admitted that he was talking to Marcus Roy the offensive coordinator who wanted to maintain a balanced attack and he told him no, run it, run it, run it, run it, run it. That as Dillingham described it, through Levitt off a rhythm. When you take your quarterback and you do not allow them to continue to kinda get things going, you're gonna regress. And Sam Levitt, although he had 20 attempts in this game, ASU ran the ball 54 times. Last week comparatively, it was almost a 50/50 split. And not a surprise, Sam Levitt tossed 200 yards. Sam Levitt tossed two touchdowns because ASU was balanced. So yeah, the run game exploded this week. However, you paid for it in the passing game because Levitt was not able to get going. When he's just handing it off, suddenly he's asked to start throwing the football. It's gonna be an adjustment for any quarterback. It's just like, unless you're in the fourth quarter and you're up 20 points and you're trying to drain clock, you still need to have a balanced attack. Sam Levitt shouldn't have attempted ball only 20 times over 60 minutes. I'm not saying he needed to attempt it 40 times, but they really limited him. And a lot of those attempts came in the second half where Sam Levitt is used to handing off the football to Cameron's gataboo. It's just a balancing act. It's a balancing act that ASU is going to need to get right moving forward. They're gonna be fine, but there are serious adjustments that need to be made moving forward to win more games. We're gonna talk about takeaways in just a moment with everything that went right, everything that went wrong, where to go to next, and of course, with a victory episode, we got some game balls to hand out. So I'll see you guys in just a moment. This is the lockdown son of a podcast part of the lockdown podcast network. Your team every day. Sandals, sunscreen, snacks for the kids, what do they have in common? Well, you're probably getting a lot of them right now. Don't stress about the cost though. Use Ivana and get cash back for all your purposes when you stock up on your essentials. Ivana is a free app that lets you earn cash back every time you shop, earn hundreds of items, tons of points from groceries, to beauty supplies, even toys. You make sure you're beating inflation no matter what you're purchasing. The average Ivana user is gonna make back $256 a year, which can cover the cost of an entire shopping trip. 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That's Ivana, I-B-O-T-T-A in the Google Play or App Store, use the code locked on college. - Okay, you can do this. - I know, I know, Ivana makes it so convenient to sell your car. It's just hard to let go. My car and I have been through so much together. - Look, you already have a great offer from Carvana. That was fast. - Well, I know my lessons played in "Vin My Heart" and those questions were easy. - You're almost there, now to just accept the offer and schedule a pick up or drop off. - How'd you do it? How were you so strong in letting go of your car? - Well, I already made up my mind and Carvana's so easy. - Yeah, true. And sold. - Go to Carvana.com to sell your car the convenient way. - One more time wherever you're getting those shows, hit like, hit, subscribe, turn on notifications. Thanks so much for making us your first lesson of the day. A special shout out to my every dayers. Let's get to the best part of the show, which is some big takeaways. By the way, we've got a lot of takeaways from this game. Good and bad. And then we're handing out game balls. Similar to how I structured it last week, ASU will have three game balls that we are going to hand out. This week, unlike last week, it's a little more structured. We are not splitting game balls. We're not awarding it to a unit. We have three individuals. All right, takeaways. Cameron Skadibu is an all-conference player. We knew going into the year as Arizona State fans, Cameron Skadibu was a star. That Cameron Skadibu was going to be someone that took the conference by storm. And guess what? That's what he's done. Through his first two games of the year, already 44 carries. It's 311 yards, 7.1 yards per pop. And a touchdown on the ground. He's also caught four passes for 52 yards. So he's doing it on the ground. He's doing it through the air. He has got 48 touches for this team. Second closest is the Carlos Brooks with 14 touches. He is this team. He is the offense. He is the run game. And yeah, he exploded for 262 yards this week, but he still was great in a rotational role. Excuse me, against Wyoming. They didn't need him to be that guy. But guess what? He still was. Seven yards, eight yards, nine yard runs. His long this year is 39. And it could have been longer. It could have been touchdown. So it's not like he has 311 yards and 80 of them came on one run. It has been consistent with him. Chunk play, chunk play, chunk play. First down, first down, first down, first down. You absolutely can trust Cameron Skadibu with this offense right now. You can trust him to be able to take over games, have explosive plays. He's going to find the ends on a lot this year. He didn't score in this game. That's not going to be the case, especially when you get the volume that he does. He will score double digit touchdowns this year. Even if ASU does start to distribute carries a little bit more consistently with the rest of a very deep back build. But nonetheless, Skadibu is a superstar. He is absolutely on the radar for the big 12. And he should be, he should be the big 12 player of the week. I will be stunned if he is not. And I will be incredibly disappointed if he's not after racking up nearly 300 yards of offense. Second takeaway, ASU was going to dominate the trenches this year. Both sides of the football, by the way. That offensive line that we hyped up earlier, any offensive line we talked about all offseason. Guess what, it's pretty, pretty good. The run blocking is exceptional. They are helping Cameron Skadibu to average over seven yards of carry. They are helping Sam Levitt to be able to break the pocket and be a dynamic runner. They are helping the rest of the back field to be able to contribute when they need to get Skadibu some breaks. They're also doing a more than quality job in past protection. There's work to be done. It is not a perfect offensive line. But as a whole, and compared to last year, regardless of the injuries, they sustained last year on the offensive line. And there was a lot. They are still night and day different. And some of the guys that are back, Maxie Onaker, Lefotano, Emmett Boldy, they have seriously improved from last year. They look like super, super good players for you. And again, there's room for improvement. It's not a perfect unit. It's still a really good unit. Defensive line is also insane. The defensive interior, they're dominating. When they get to 100% health, when Jeff Clark, when CJ Fite, when Zach Swanson, when Jacob Rich Congaika are able to just play it 100% 'cause right now, that group is banged up. They're killing the trenches. You can't run on this team. You can't run on them. Pass Rush is there too. ASU has six sacks this year as a pass rush. Five of them have come from the defensive line. Two of them have come from Elijah O'Neill, who the locked ensemble's podcast, picked as a breakout player for this year. Clayton Smith should have two sacks, by the way. He was absolutely robbed of a sack in this game. Also, I lied. The linebackers do have two sacks. I forgot the KVN Thunderbird had a sack in week one. Four of your six sacks from the defensive line, two of them from an edge rusher we picked to break out. Next thing, the linebackers, really, really good. Keishan Elliott, gonna be a star. Sam Levitt has a lot to do. He has a lot of work to do as a passer. ASU was not anticipating Sam Levitt to lead the big 12 in passing yards. They were not anticipating him to come out and throw 30 touchdowns. What they needed him to do this year was manage football games, not make any mistakes. He's done that. Four touchdowns this year. Two through the air, two on the ground. He is 7.8 yards per attempt. He has only taken three sacks. He has run 415 yards. He's doing what you need to do. The problem, it's not super efficient. He is barely 50% completion right now. The 7.8 yards per attempt, it's fine. It's not elite for him. Of his 327 passing yards, he had a 68 yard touchdown. So the numbers inflated a little bit. They have got to get better through the air. He had less than 100 passing yards in this game. That can't happen moving forward. I don't care if the run game goes over 300 again. You need Levitt to be able to toss 150. You need Levitt to be able to make sure that if a team wants to come up and play seven guys in the box, that he can pass the ball down the field. The deep ball will come. It is what it is. Guys are right there. Levitt needs to hit it, but like I said, I don't know if he's going to consistently hit that deep ball until after the bye week. I really don't. I think it's just gonna take some more time. But he needs to hit the intermediate stuff on a consistent basis. He did it last week against Wyoming. There was tons of chunk plays over the middle of the field. Tons of 10 to 15 plus yard completions. He can do it. We just need him to consistently do it. I mentioned on the podcast, I wanted him to start establishing a connection with the number one receiver. Didn't do that this week. And I think it shows that we need to have that balanced attack moving forward. Take away number four here. Kenny Dillingham needs and wants to play balance and is also planning on trusting his coordinators a little more. He admitted post game that he went to Marcus Royal, the offensive coordinator. He said, "Hey, we're gonna run the football a lot." Royal wanted to remain balanced from what we are to understand. And Kenny kind of overruled him. And he said, "Look, we're dominating on the ground game. That's what we're gonna keep doing." Well, Mississippi State makes the adjustments. Uh-oh, uh-oh, what are you gonna do now? ASU has got to be balanced. And Kenny Dillingham says himself, he needs to put the trust in his offensive coordinator, in his defensive coordinator a little bit more. He doesn't want to completely control the game. He gets the last say, for sure. But Kenny Dillingham himself says, "You know what? I need to work on the head coaching part of this and give the rights over to Coach Royal." Last takeaway here before we hand out some game balls, ASU can win close games this year. You know what they couldn't do last year? Win the close games. ASU won three games last year. They were in four others. You could have been seven and five last year if you could finish games. They just couldn't do it. As I have said before, it was a team that didn't know how to win. Call it as it is. They know how to win this year. They're two in L. They crushed Wyoming. They held on against Mississippi State. When they needed to close out the game, guess what? They made the plays they needed to do. And they did it in the ground game. They put the trust in Cameron's Caterpillar. They are facing a stacked box. Mississippi State is selling out on the run, but when they needed to most, they got it done. Offensive line was able to create some holes. Cameron's got to get skinny. He runs dudes over. When it mattered most, the offense stepped up. PS, the defense did too. They were able to take a Mississippi State team that was rolling. They were dominating in the second half. They were on a drive to drive basis, doing whatever they wanted. The defense was able to get one drive that really slowed down their momentum in the second half where they held them to five plays for five yards. Now, unfortunately, the next drive, they gave up an 80 yard score. But then ASU's offense came out and shoot up the last five plus minutes of the game. So they gave up three touchdowns in the second half, but they were able to hold Mississippi State from a fourth touchdown. And guess what, ASU won by a touchdown. They needed the defense to get a stop. And when they needed it, they got it. Then the offense steps up. ASU knows how to win games this year. We're two games into the season, and we already know this. This is a tough schedule, by the way. You weren't facing all five of the teams that were in the preseason poll. You're facing Arizona, Utah, Kansas, Kansas State, Oklahoma State this year. Suddenly five unwinnable games feel like you should be able to be competitive in them, at worst. You could still go own five. That's very real possibility. But you're gonna be able to make close games this year. And ASU looks like they can win those close games. Let's hand out three game balls to wrap out. One has been a very long podcast, so I appreciate you guys for sticking around for this. Three game balls, number one, Cameron Skadibu. Come on, what else needs to be said about Cameron Skadibu? And a historic performance for the Sun Devils. 262 yards on 33 carries, three catches 35 yards. He had a ton of longs in this game, ton of chunk plays, tons of first downs. You couldn't ask for much more of a guy who contributed like 80% of the offense or something like that. He's a beast, he's a stud. You're now winning this game without Skadibu. Absolutely gets the first game ball. Snacking game ball, this was tough, but I'm giving it the CJ fight. CJ made a huge play. Clayton Smith was able to force Blake Shapen to the outside. Shapen fumbles the ball away. CJ fight picks it up, takes it into the end zone. The balance, again, like this was ballerina skills to be able to stay in bounds and just extend the ball and pass the pile on. That defensive touchdown ultimately ended up being the game difference. His youth offense was all but shut out in the second half. They got three points. So that defensive touchdown ended up being the difference in this game. Shout out CJ fight for getting it done. Last game ball, we're going to Brian Ward for a second consecutive week. Arizona State only allowed 84 yards on the first half. They gave up 214 in the second, but that was also because ASU couldn't do anything through the offense. They couldn't pass the ball and Mississippi State sold out on the run. So yeah, they gave up a ton of yards in the second half compared to what they gave up in the first half. But they got three sacks, they got a turnover, a defensive touchdown, and they once again dominated the ground game. 26 carries for 30 yards. Ladies and gentlemen, they are allowing less than a yard per carry on the year through two games, a single touchdown. The longest carry for Mississippi State yesterday was nine yards. You're not running on this team. Brian Ward is coaching his you know what off. This is an unbelievable effort from a guy that who he's going to get calls this off season. Whether it's another power forward program that wants to promote him, or it's a team that wants to make him their head coach. So until then, we're going to enjoy everything that Brian Ward is doing, and he's going to get a second game ball. That is going to wrap up a 40 minute podcast for the Sun Devils. We had lots of good, we had lots of bad, we had lots of takeaways, and we were able to hand out game balls for the second week in a row, which I don't remember the last time we did that. So, thank you for tuning in to this edition of the locked on Sun Devils podcast. Wherever you're getting your shows, hit like, hit subscribe, turn on notifications so you get that update when we post new content, hit subscribe on YouTube, help us get to 1,000 subscribers. We're going to get there before the end of the month. We are absolutely killing it. The amount of people that are dialed into the show right now is surreal, and I appreciate each and every single one of you for getting us to this point. Stay in touch with everything, follow me on Twitter @RitchieBrad36, the podcast @LO_Sun Devils. One more time, I appreciate you all for tuning in. We will be back again tomorrow. We got to hand out some greats. We're going to look at the offense, we're going to look at the defense, we're going to look at the coaching staff, and we're going to grade this team overall. I will see you there. Till then, you keep a lot of right here on locked on Sun Devils. (upbeat music) Prime members, you can listen to this locked on podcast ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today. (upbeat music)
