Arizona State head coach Kenny Dillingham is down to his final checklist for his spring football goals. With the installs and fundamentals mastered, the team tackled a laser-focused agenda for Tuesday’s scrimmage. The 32-year-old head coach repeatedly tasked the offense in Tuesday’s scrimmage to convert in specific situations, setting a range for down and distance to extend drives with heightened awareness by the defense.

“We preach it every single day,” Dillingham said. “Communication and situational awareness, right? We coach situation awareness every single day. Our practices are built around it. I’m screaming on the mic. I mean, it’s that important to understand situational football.

“I think the guys are trying to do what we ask. I just think some of this stuff takes time to train the mind to say, ‘Hey, it’s second-and-5. Watch freeze cadence. Hey, the ball is on the plus 37 (yard line), and it’s third-and-2. That’s not a real third down because they’re going to go for it on fourth down. That’s a free down, shot alert.’ I am pleased with how we’re working, but we still have a long way to go.”

The defense understandably dominated the situation period, given they were spurred by small hints that Dillingham would drop before each snap about what plays to expect. The offense was sluggish early, with several drives with minimal movement. Junior running back Cam Skattebo, who transferred from Sacramento State this offseason, tried to keep his side of the ball mellow and even-keeled despite the initial adversity.

“The way everybody talks is that our defense has changed a bunch,” Skattebo remarked. “(Defensive coordinator) Coach Ward does a great job with those guys. I just try to stay positive and keep the energy on the offense the same every day, no matter if we are high or low. You never can get too high; you can never get too low. You just got to stay at a steady pace. That’s what I tried to help a bit today, to make sure everybody was the same old at practice even though we were up and down here and there.”

Skattebo has quickly garnered recognition in the backfield (and among his defensive teammates, too, for that matter) for his bruising style coupled with his low center of gravity. The 5-10 222-pound back was the Big Sky Offensive Player of the Year last season. He rushed for 1,382 yards and seven touchdowns on the No. 2 offense in the FCS.

When faced with those do-or-die moments at practice, Skattebo’s approach is simple: hit or be hit.

“Me as a running back, I expect the defense to know exactly what I’m doing the whole time,” Skattebo noted. “Like on a run play, I expect that linebacker to fill the hole that I’m looking at. When I go through that hole, I’m expecting to hit somebody. If it’s 4th-and-2, I’m expecting to run through somebody. When he calls my name, it’s take your opportunity and run with it.”

An emphasis for the running back room as a whole has been catching the ball out of the backfield. Arizona State has benefited from the likes of talented dual-threat running backs in the past, but if practices are any indication, this year’s offense figures to feature them at an unprecedented rate. It’s not uncommon for the quarterback to counter the blitz with a pass to the running back or instantly pull the trigger on a hot route out of the backfield based on coverage indications both before and after the snap.

As Oregon’s offensive coordinator last year, Dillingham often got the ball to the running backs through the air. The position group in Eugene assembled 73 receptions across four different playmakers. Needless to say, Skattebo is excited about his position’s enlarged involvement in the passing game.

“For me, that’s awesome because I didn’t really catch the ball growing up, and I felt like I could have,” Skattebo said. “In high school, I caught six passes in four years. In college, I’ve caught 60 in two. So I think being out here in a passing offense is definitely going to help grow my versatility a lot.”

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Wide receivers coach Ra’Shaad Samples took time after the scrimmage to reflect on the development of his players over his first 12 practices on Arizona State’s staff. Samples, who was the youngest assistant in the NFL last season coaching running backs with the Los Angeles Rams, wants his group to embrace the collision course of challenges they are inevitably headed for in the fall.

“I think we’re in a good place,” Sample stated. “I’m never happy about where we’re at. I always want better. I think we’re continuously working, and that’s the most important thing. It’s going to be a process all the way up to the season, and even during the season, this thing is like a rollercoaster. So we talk about riding that rollercoaster all the way through the ups and the downs, staying on, not hopping off, and being confident all the way through.”

The crown jewel of the receiver group is Idaho State transfer Xavier Guillory, who hit the ground running with several touchdowns on the first day of practice. Since then, Guillory has been a consistent aerial threat in the 11-on-11 and one-on-one periods, using his dangerous speed and deception throughout his route tree to earn open looks. Samples has been impressed with Guillory’s mindset the most, which he believes will push the junior receiver to greater heights.

“It starts with his approach,” Samples explained. “The biggest part of Guillory’s game is mental. We talked about preseason catching a bunch of balls. That kid probably caught 10,000 balls from JUGS (machine) in a month-and-a-half span.

“You talk about a guy who works his butt off; he’s always mentally prepared; he’s always asking questions in the film room. He just has a great mental toughness about himself. He’ll let you coach him really hard, and he wants to be coached really hard. It’s been great coaching him, and he’s definitely exceeded expectations.”

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Arizona State’s spring game kicks off on April 15 at Sun Devil Stadium following Pat’s run. Dillingham has long maintained his goal of seeing 40,000 fans in the seats, and the program has undoubtedly generated a serious amount of momentum since that original declaration made in December. The 32-year-old head coach also wants to see how the roster, boasting 43 new players, responds when pressure is added to the equation of performance.

“Just hoping to see the people in the first time for us in an environment with fans,” Dillingham said of his expectations. “Do you catch the ball, do you not? Do you win your one-on-one with everybody watching? Because it’s very easy to play football with nobody watching. The game is played in front of people. The game is played with a little bit of pressure about yourself. So who rises to the occasion in that gamelike setting?

“Oh, I’m excited,” Samples admitted. “This is my first game experience here. I’m excited to see what it looks like. I’ve heard this place can really get rocking and get rolling, and the fans can be really excited and be loud. So I’m excited to get everybody here and let them see all the work we put in.”

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