One half of football came and went Saturday night in Provo without redshirt freshman running back Daniyel Ngata stepping onto the field for Arizona State. With sophomore running back DeaMonte Trayanum unavailable due to injury, Ngata was available to spell redshirt senior Rachaad White if need be.

Yet through two quarters of play, the Sun Devils never called the number of Ngata, who scored touchdowns in each of ASU’s first two non-conference matchups. During Arizona State’s 37-10 victory over UNLV, Ngata dislocated his thumb and had to return to the locker room to have it put back in place. He returned to the field for the second half and contributed two first-down runs. Leading up to the first road trip of the season for ASU, Ngata was limited in practice throughout the week.

“He was struggling with nicks and bruises, so I wanted to make sure that it was a process where Rachaad was getting it, and we could come in with Daniyel,” explained running backs coach Shaun Aguano of the decision to rest Ngata for the entirety of the first half against the Cougars. “I didn’t want him to get beat up early, and then we would be down to just one guy.”

As the first half unfolded, Aguano kept Ngata engaged. And so did Trayanum and White. Aguano made sure to tell Ngata to stay ready, knowing that an opportunity would come his way eventually. At the same time, Ngata’s backfield peers continued to give insight into what they saw from the BYU defense.

“I’m following coach Aguano, really. It all comes down to trust in my coach. I’m ready whenever my name is called,” Ngata said. “A big thing was Rachaad and (Trayanum) coming to talk to me. Even in the first half, I wasn’t playing at all, but they would come and talk to me and tell me what they see.

“Chip is a really smart player. Even when he’s not playing, he’s still on there coaching.”

When White exited for a breather after the opening plays of the second half and Ngata’s services were summoned, the Folsom, Calif., native shined. Ngata averaged 10.3 yards per carry on his eight attempts, totaling 82 yards on the ground with his fresh legs against a physical BYU defense.

“He came in and gave us a huge boost,” Aguano said of the third-quarter performance for Ngata.

On Arizona State’s first drive of the second half, Ngata saw action. His first two carries went for first downs, gaining 12 on the first and a chunk of 26 yards on the second before BYU was able to stop him for a gain of just three on his third carry. When offensive coordinator Zak Hill went back to him for a fourth consecutive carry, Ngata rewarded ASU with a 10-yard touchdown run, his third of the young 2021 season.

“We could’ve done a lot better,” Ngata said of he and the offense’s rushing performance on Saturday. With White being held to just 4.7 yards per carry and no contribution on the ground from junior quarterback Jayden Daniels, the Sun Devils tallied 161 yards on the ground and failed to reach their goal of 200 rushing yards in a game for the first time this year. “We failed our goal, and that’s not good.”

As Arizona State traveled home, Aguano said second-guessing himself was natural, especially after what Ngata displayed in the absence of Trayanum.

“There’s always an afterthought of ‘should I have gone to him earlier?’” Aguano told reporters Tuesday. “But he did an incredible job coming in.”

During the challenging moments, one of the loudest voices, according to Aguano, is Ngata. The 5-foot-9 running back is a vocal leader despite his quiet demeanor around media members.

“He’s a resilient kid. He’s a tough-minded kid,” the Sun Devil running backs coach explained. “Don’t take his quietness for his non-competitiveness because he’s probably the most competitive… It feels like maybe he’s the third wheel, and every day he comes in competing. It’s never an afterthought to him that I’m going to sit back and let those guys go.

“Every time the last couple of games that he’s got in, he’s been very productive. He’s making sure that I don’t take him off the field, and that’s a good thing.”

Despite his success, Ngata said that the offense was moving too slow in its trip to Provo. The success on the ground, he claimed could’ve been better had the Sun Devils executed operationally with more precision.

“There’s a lot of things on film that we came back and saw that we need to improve on,” Ngata explained. “Just improving on the run game, a lot more. Some people may think it’s good, but we’re trying to get a lot better. We’re trying to get excellent.”

The onus for ASU’s penalties and sloppiness in offensive execution – the Sun Devils committed seven false starts and one illegal motion – falls on the players, according to Ngata. The second-year Sun Devil claimed the coaches have given the proper instruction to the players, but the discipline required to execute it needs to be shown going forward.

“Everything they are teaching us is the right things,” Ngata said. Through three games, Arizona State’s average of 92 penalty yards per game ranks 126th out of 130 Division 1 programs. “Us as players, we have to be more disciplined in our practice and going into meetings. It really should start with us first.”

On numerous occasions, miscommunication between Daniels and White led to blown up plays in the backfield. When Arizona State had success with its signals and play-calling, it often had success with the running game, too.

“Whenever things don’t go right, and you feel like it could be controllable, it’s always a disappointment,” Aguano said. At times, Daniels and White appeared on different pages as the Sun Devil signal-caller turned to hand the ball off only to have no running back to give the ball to. “They were loud. They did a good job disrupting our cadence. I thought that we needed to be closer focused to detail and able to overcome that, especially with the maturity level of our offense.”

After leaving Lavell Edwards Stadium with a blemish on their resumé, Ngata said the Sun Devils were disappointed in the result. White tweeted out his thoughts, claiming that he needed to improve after a game that saw the redshirt senior carry the ball 15 times for 71 yards and a touchdown.

“Because we really feel in the running back room like we should win those games, they take it hard on themselves because they know they are the leaders of the group,” Aguano said of White’s tweet. “I told him not to be as hard on himself… We’ll come back and fix it and be ready for Colorado.”

Entering Pac-12 play with only one program – Oregon – still undefeated allows the Sun Devils a chance to start clean, as head coach Herm Edwards mentioned during his Monday meeting with the media.

“The mood in the locker room is kind of amazed, surprised that we lost,” Ngata claimed. “We were all playing the game, and I don’t think we were supposed to lose that game. You guys know it was ASU versus ASU, really. We shot ourselves in the foot.

“We’re still hungry. The season’s not over at all. It just got started. We have the same goals.”

To meet those goals, though, Ngata said a re-evaluation must be done by everyone.

“It really goes back to everything,” he said. “Practice. Weight room. Everything. Just that discipline carries onto the game; it goes to showing up to meetings. We have to change everything that we do because that last game wasn’t acceptable at all.”

Join your fellow Sun Devil fans on our premium message board, the Devils’ Huddle, to discuss this article and other ASU football, basketball, and recruiting topics. Not a member yet? Sign up today here and get all the latest Sun Devil news!