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Defense keeps it close, offense comes up clutch when it matters most

In a classic defensive standoff, the Arizona State Sun Devils (3-0) knocked off the No. 18 Michigan State Spartans (2-1) 10-7 Saturday afternoon in East Lansing.

“It’s a big-time win,” starting true freshman quarterback Jayden Daniels said. “Just know that our defense played lights out, great coaching gave us an opportunity to win, and then we can play with anybody in the country. Just watch out for ASU.”

After another stagnant day on offense, ASU came to life in its final drive orchestrating an 11-play, a 75-yard march that ended with a one-yard touchdown rush by junior running back Eno Benjamin with 50 seconds to play.

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Freshman quarterback Jayden Daniels ran for 27 yards on the drive- highlighted by his 15-yard scramble on 4th & 13, and completed a 40-yard pass to senior receiver Brandon Aiyuk- who finished with 5 catches and a team-high 64 yards- that got ASU down to the Spartan 25 on the drive’s third play.

“Somewhere along the line, running verticals, running somebody deep, somebody was going to pop,” offensive coordinator Rob Likens said. “I knew that Jayden was going to kind of Johnny Manziel his way out of there man.

“I was at Temple University in 1998 when we went to Blacksburg, Virginia. We were 36.5-point underdogs and beat Virginia Tech if you guys remember that game. It was one of the biggest upsets in the history of college football, and that wasn’t even close to what we did today- not even close, because of the predicament that we were in with our offensive line, and our quarterback and who we were going against. I’m just trying to wrap it all around my mind man.”

Still, Michigan State had one last effort in them after the score, even with no timeouts. They got into field goal range for junior kicker Matt Coghlin- largely thanks to a a questionable 15-yard penalty for pass interference on junior Tillman safety Evan Fields, which was followed by a 25-yard completion to senior wideout Darrell Stewart Jr. (led both teams with 9 catches, 121 yards).

“I might have to go study what pass interference is again because I thought Evan did a good job,” defensive coordinator Danny Gonzales commented.

Coghlin had already missed from 47 and then 31 yards out in the final two MSU drives of the first half, but he was able to redeem himself by hitting a 42-yarder to tie the game at the end…or so he thought.

As it would turn out, the Spartans had 12 men on the field, which the officials reviewed and confirmed, forcing Coughlin to rekick from 47 yards away- a kick he shanked badly to the left.

Redshirt freshman safety Cam Phillips should’ve been flagged a 15-yard penalty for hopping the line on the kick, which would’ve allowed a third rekick from 32 yards, but the officials kept their flags in their pockets, a sort of ‘make-up non-call,’ if you will, for the aforementioned penalty on Fields.

“We kick a field goal, they try and hurdle us, that should be a penalty,” Spartans head coach Mark Dantonio said. “But that’s just to get to overtime, there’s a lot of opportunities prior to that where we could’ve won the football game. So, I think that they need to take a hard look at the officiating, that’s all I’ll say.”

Despite being outgained 404-216 on the day, ASU hung tough and actually led 3-0 with less than nine minutes to go. Sure, the pair of missed field goals by Coghlin helped, but there was no doubt the Sun Devils were keeping the Spartans right where they wanted them throughout the contest- in a one-score defensive battle.

However, MSU’s offense finally broke through with 8:37 left in regulation. Senior quarterback Brian Lewerke, a Phoenix native, and Pinnacle high school he alum, completed five of his six passes on the 10 play, 70-yard drive.

This included completions to four different receivers, with three going for first downs and two of those three coming on third down. Ultimately, redshirt freshman running back Elijah Collins capped the drive with a five-yard run and then a nine-yard carry for the game’s first touchdown, giving the Spartans a four-point lead.

“I thought our guys played their tails off for the whole game,” Gonzales said. “We gave up another fourth-quarter drive. Two of that calls- two of the third downs were on me. Like I said, coaches screw things up sometimes. I made a couple of bad calls.

“We won the game, and give the players credit because players win games. We’re building something here that has a chance to be really special…21 (points allowed) in three games, now we get into league play, every week the teams are going to get better and we got to build on that. It’s always easier when you win a game to teach things.”

After MSU scored their first touchdown, it seemed like the Sun Devil defense might run out of gas again in the fourth quarter, much like Gonzales said they did in the first two contests against Kent State and Sacramento State. But despite the offense going three-and-out on the response drive to MSU’s score, ASU’s defense came out and forced the same out of the Spartans.

Stopping Michigan State so quickly is what allowed Daniels and the offense to get the ball back with plenty of time to work with, 3:34 to be exact, which allowed the unit to orchestrate what would go on to be the game-winning drive.

Additionally, Gonzales felt a responsibility to take the blame for allowing MSU to even have the chance to tie the game at the end.

“I apologize for the last 50 seconds, that’s on me,” Gonzales said. “I think when you play soft in prevent, it prevents you from winning- it almost did, so lesson learned. I’d rather give up something big and go with what we do, and our mantra is be aggressive and that’s how we were able to slow them down.”

Fields ended up pacing ASU with 13 tackles, including a key stop on a 4th & 1, leading the next closest Sun Devils by five. Other notable performances came from redshirt freshman safety Cam Phillips (6 tackles, 0.5 TFL’s, 2 pass breakups), sophomore defensive end Jermayne Lole (eight tackles, one sack), sophomore safety Aashari Crosswell (4 tackles, pass breakup, forced fumble for game’s only turnover), and senior linebacker Khaylan Kearse-Thomas (3 tackles, 0.5 TFL’s, 1 pass breakup in the game limited by injury).

Sophomore linebackers Darien Butler and Merlin Robertson each had eight tackles themselves, with Butler adding a half tackle-for-loss.

“I feel like it started in practice earlier this week, we just all tried our best in practice to stay sound and just trying to figure out what their feel of the game and we executed,” Butler said.

This game proved to be a huge coming-out party for the Sun Devil defense, as not a single player who saw the field proved to be a weak link.

ASU returns to action next Saturday when it hosts the Colorado Buffaloes (2-1) at Sun Devil Stadium. The game will kick off at 7 p.m. and air on Pac-12 Network.

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