Arizona State has plenty of problems on both sides of the ball through the season’s first four games. Each position coach has a bone or two to pick with their position group. Coach Robert Rodriguez is no exception. He’s been outspoken about his overall dissatisfaction with the pass rush but maintains the deficiencies have almost nothing to do with sack numbers. Coach Rod wants to see opposing quarterbacks uncomfortable, whether they end up on the ground or not.
“I’m the first in line to say that it hasn’t been good enough. It just hasn’t been productive enough,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t judge it by sacks. If you watch the Oklahoma State game, I was pleased with how we got to the quarterback. Desperation does some bad things to pass rushers; I’ve seen it at every level. We pride ourselves on having our eyes down and our hands in front of us. The buck stops right here when it comes to that.”
Rodriguez’s passionate and often long-winded answers echo the intensity he shows his players on the practice field. The defensive line is consistently one of the hardest working position groups at the Kajikawa practice fields. Their lack of quarterback pressure during the first third of the season isn’t due to apathy, but it may be due to scheme. Rodriguez wants his guys to take advantage of any one on one opportunity.
“We’re not a big blitz heavy team, so our four-man pressure is gonna have to stand up against five, six, seven guys,” he said. “But there’s always one-on-ones, there are always opportunities to pressure the quarterback, and we have not done that at a high enough rate. Sacks I throw out the window, but in terms of the amount of time we get in the quarterback’s lap, that hasn’t been good enough.”
USC doesn’t just have weapons on offense; they have nuclear warheads. Quarterback Caleb Williams, running back Travis Dye, and perhaps most notably, wide receiver Jordan Addison. All three levels of the ASU defense have had a forgettable two-week stretch. It’s about to get a whole lot harder for Donnie Henderson’s unit on Saturday night at the Los Angeles Coliseum.
“They have a lot of good athletes, and they do a great job stretching the field and attacking you vertically,” safety Khoury Bethley said. “They have him (Jordan Addison), but they also have a lot of other guys who can get the ball who are just as capable as him. We just have to lock in on the film; they have so many athletes that you can’t just key in one guy.”
It’s clear that the defense has been making a home in the film room over the last few days. Not only are they analyzing their numerous shortcomings from the Utah game, but they’re also studying up on the many ways USC can hurt them.
“They pass the ball, they’re a great air raid team, they can stretch the field very vertically like I said,” Bethley said. “As defensive backs, you really have to be able to adjust. That’s what we sign up for. One week you might be playing a run heavy team, and the next a passing team, we gotta cover and have to be able to tackle as well.”
Fans (and media members) may have been surprised by defensive coordinator Donnie Henderson’s summary of the loss to Utah.
“I was thrilled with this game how we played the first three quarters. We gave up a couple of touchdowns, a broken play and a long boot coming back across the field to the tight end,” Henderson said. “Other than that, we just have to do a lot better job of tackling that’s what it comes down to. It wasn’t as bad as you think; however, it still needs to be improved.”
One of the few feel-good stories to come from Saturday night’s loss was the play of defensive back Isaiah Johnson. The redshirt freshman was highly regarded as a high school recruit but ran into some off-the-field issues that have so far kept him from truly blossoming in Arizona State’s defensive backfield. Some shuffling in the secondary has allowed him an opportunity, and Henderson says it’s not one Johnson takes lightly.
“I was happy to see how he performed. Because that’s all he talks about, ‘give me a chance, and I’ll show you I can do it’ and he played like 70-plus snaps,” Henderson said. “I’ll tell you what he did, he competed. I was thrilled to see his performance, and I’m sure he was too. I’ve seen maturity; he came in with a chip on his shoulder, had some personal issues that he had to deal with. There’s been some maturing, and the confidence usually comes through practice.”
Bethley’s sentiment regarding the challenge USC poses to the Sun Devil defense was echoed by the defensive coordinator. Henderson took time to highlight each of USC’s formidable offensive weapons, alluding to the transfers Lincoln Riley was able to bring in through the portal as the key players that can hurt you.
“It’s gonna be a challenge. We’re going to have to do some things to slow them down a little bit,” Henderson said. “We can’t just let them run up and down the field because if they start to use their speed, it could be a long day.”
Complimentary football is something ASU hasn’t done very well in the early part of the campaign. Often times both sides of the ball have struggled, but when one finds its stride, the other rarely does the same at the same time. Aguano’s aggressive nature is something that Henderson says the defense has to be aware of and learn to feed off of.
“Coach (Aguano) has talked about the fact that he’s going to be aggressive. That for us as a defense makes us think we have to be aggressive along with him,” Henderson said. “We stopped them on some third-and-two and third-and-three but struggled on 4th. I told the defense get ready for it; there’s going to be some third or fourth downs that the offense goes for, and we’re going to have to come put out the fire.”
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