This is it.

The Arizona State Sun Devils have officially reached crunch time. They’re in good position, according to overall public opinion, entering said crunch time, but they’re taking nothing for granted.

That’s how the mantra should be in March, in college basketball. Nothing’s ever set in stone.

And that’s exactly what the mantra is, according to head coach Bobby Hurley. The single-elimination tournament starts now.

“I told the guys, there’s no more time to lose and learn from it,” Hurley said. “We’ve got to get past that. These games now, it’s single-elimination time. You’ve got to string together multiple wins.”

It may not be that cut-and-dry, or that dire of a situation, in the eyes of the committee, but the Sun Devils don’t want to leave anything in question

“At this point in the season, if you don’t have an edge, we’re in a lot deeper trouble than we expect,” redshirt senior forward Zylan Cheatham said. “All our guys, we know what’s at stake. We know what type of environment we’re coming in… I really like our chances going into this weekend.”

Crunch time to starts with a trip to Tucson. Saturday, ASU will pay a visit to the rival Arizona Wildcats for a rematch of the Sun Devils Jan. 31 95-88 overtime win.

The Wildcats haven’t been, well, the Wildcats. They sit at 17-13 and 8-9 in the Pac-12, good for a tie for ninth place. Their at-large hopes are, essentially, non-existent.

So, in one way, they have “less” on the line when they play the Sun Devils. No regular season win is going to fault Arizona into the NCAA Tournament.

But on the flip side, they can do plenty of damage to ASU’s hopes, while also giving themselves a bit of momentum entering a Pac-12 tournament that, for the Wildcats, is do or die.

And between that, and the quality of “punch” he saw from Sean Miller and his Arizona team back in January, there’s no way Bobby Hurley is taking this one lightly.

“He’s had to deal with so much adversity, with the injuries, losing so many key players from last year yet his team just fights and battles,” Hurley said. “Their defensive positioning is elite… He just does such a great job getting his players to compete.”

Then again, that win earlier this season was Hurley’s first over the Wildcats. He’s still never won in Tucson, despite coming close a year ago.

There’s a reason for that. Sure, Arizona’s last three teams have been significantly better than the 2018-19 edition, but winning the road isn’t easy. It’s even more difficult when it’s your rival’s home floor on which you’re trying to steal a victory.

“He takes every game seriously, but with all that’s been said, just considering it’s a rivalry, just considering the history of ASU-Arizona, it’s going to be a high-level game regardless of what else is added into it,” Cheatham said. “It’s not a secret, we know that we haven’t won down there. That’s something that we want to do.”

“It’s more of a team thing,” Hurley said. “When you’re on the road, and you know that the crowd is going to be live, you’d better be communicating, have great huddles, echoing commands, and doing the things that are necessary, especially at the offensive end.”

“You’ve got to play exceptionally hard when you’re on someone else’s home court,” Cheatham added. “I like to say you’ve got to be at least 10 points better than a team going into their home court because you’ve got to consider some of the calls they’re going to get, that extra energy… I know what’s at stake, we know what’s at stake, we’ve just got to come out and execute at a high level.”

On top of being able to handle the challenges of a hostile environment, Hurley is looking for some of the traits that have been synonymous with success in ASU’s winning four of its last five contests.

“When we’re playing well on the offensive end and moving the ball, and getting high-percentage shots, we’ve proven that we can be pretty successful. That’s got to be the focus. Our shot selection’s got to be on point, we’ve got to take care of the ball, especially on the road.”

And the hope is, that such a level of play will translate when it matters most.

“We’ve been playing pretty good basketball. This time of year, that’s all you really want. It’s our last opportunity, our last regular season opportunity. You want to be playing great basketball going into postseason tournaments.”

~~~

OTHER NOTES

→ Luguentz Dort is starting to look like his old self again, most notably with improved shooting both from the charity stripe and beyond the arc. Hurley’s thoughts on the freshman’s progression:

“I just think that freshmen typically go through a phase during the season where they may not be at their best. It’s a new experience playing in this time of a competitive season, being a young guy. He’s grown mentally with his decision-making, understanding shot selection… He works at it, he’s in the gym, he puts the time in. That’s a developing area of his game, and we’re seeing him make great strides.”

→ Taeshon Cherry was knocked out early in ASU’s Sunday win over Oregon State. Hurley’s update on his status:

“Taeshon was not in today and he’s still day-to-day. We’re continuing to just closely watch him and when he’s fully ready, then he’ll be out there… He has not really demonstrated the concussion symptoms. He was happy and appears to be healthy, but we’re trying to be very conservative with him because he’s had a few examples of it over the last few weeks.”