On Saturday night, Arizona State football trundled back home to Tempe after a heartbreaking fourth-quarter collapse that saw the Sun Devils yield a 14-point surge from the USC Trojans in less than four and a half minutes.

The loss was shattering for ASU, as a statement win on national television against its premier opponent in the Pac-12 South would’ve been monumental for the program’s development and a key first step towards the goals of a conference crown and beyond.

Despite the pre-season preparation, the excitement entering the game, and the disappointment that may have lingered, the sun still rose over A Mountain in Tempe on Sunday morning, basking ASU in golden rays of sunshine and ringing in a new day.

“I don’t think anybody’s ever happy (with losing) …It’s like having a bad day at work,” co-defensive coordinator Antonio Pierce said. “Going into the game with the hype, the national exposure, the way the game played out, and the lead we had, there’s going to be some disappointment.”

There’s no way to change what happened last Saturday against the Trojans, no magical ability to help ASU recover the onside kick or alter the coverage on 4th and 13, or 4th and 9.

Yet, as painful as it may be to rewatch, there is the value of reviewing ASU’s fourth-quarter blunders in order to make sure it doesn’t happen again, specifically this week against the California Golden Bears.

“You have to have that move-on mentality that goes for a play that goes for a game. Cal’s not going to feel sorry for us when we kick off the ball here on Saturday, and today we didn’t feel sorry for ourselves and went out there and worked and had a good practice,” Pierce stated.

When analyzing its mistakes, ASU’s most blinding defensive blunders came on defending third and fourth-down situations. While the ASU offense was able to somewhat counteract the effects of the USC’s third-down success with similar numbers (USC 7-19, ASU 6-14), they did not deliver the same fourth down results. In the fourth quarter alone, the Trojans successfully converted four times on fourth downs.

“(The biggest mistakes for ASU) were situations where you expect to get off the field and give your offense either a short field or the ball back,” Pierce explained. “3rd and 17, the fourth downs in the fourth quarter, those were critical.”

Fitting with trends across the football landscape at both the collegiate and professional levels, ASU struggled to make tackles. With ASU taking away the vertical threats on the sidelines, USC picked on the Sun Devil safeties and linebackers, going to the middle through the air. The USC receivers' size and speed proved to be too much in the open field, despite a valiant effort from the Sun Devils by running hard to stop the ballcarrier on each play.

Alongside the flashes of USC’s air raid offense, the Trojans mustered a very effective running game as well. This duality caught the Sun Devils off guard at times, as finding a balance between the soft zone coverage to prevent gains through the air and packing the box to stop the run proved to be a difficult task to manage for Pierce and co-coordinator Marvin Lewis.

“Tackling (was critical), but we knew that going into the game,” Pierce admitted. “I think, for the most part, those guys were flying around; we had 11 hats at times on the ball; you like to keep rallying. You’d also like to see the run defense (perform better), that kind of shocked us a little bit that they were able to run the ball at times during the game.”

Yet there are some things that Pierce and the rest of the Sun Devils can be proud of too.

On a day where ASU’s defense played 95 snaps, over half of them being pass plays, and spent over 34 minutes on the field, there’s bound to be errors and mistakes. But for 55 minutes of play, the Sun Devils corralled potentially the most explosive offense in Pac-12.

While 381 passing yards and two touchdowns by USC sophomore quarterback Kedon Slovis looks bad for ASU on the stat sheet if you ask Pierce, he tells a different story about ASU’s DBs, one that presents a feeling of pleasure and contempt, rather than disappointment and regret.

“I think overall our DBs for the amount of snaps they played – 95, with 55-plus pass plays, going against SC’s receivers that are highly talented, I thought they were very physical, I thought they executed the game plan which we wanted them to do and dictate where (USC) was going to throw the ball at times in the game,” Pierce noted.

Turnovers, an aspect of the game ASU performed well at in 2019, carried over into the contest against USC. Every Wednesday, Pierce and the ASU defense go through drills in practice, working on their abilities to force turnovers.

On Wednesday, Pierce referenced the turnovers, along with two players in the Sun Devil secondary who performed particularly well overall, while also forcing the turnover initiative.

The first, senior corner Chase Lucas, had seven total tackles on Saturday and assisted greatly in taking away the vertical threats of the USC receivers. However, Lucas had his biggest moment of the day at the beginning of the second half. A four-year starter for ASU, Lucas made a heads-up play, punching the pigskin out of the grasp of redshirt senior Trojan receiver Tyler Vaughns for a fumble that was recovered by ASU.

“Chase Lucas played one of the best games since I've been here with him,” Pierce said, praising one of his veterans. “His composure, the way he competed, the way he bounced back when he was on the sideline. To me, he took a tremendous step in a senior year that we expected to be very bright for him and us.”

The other member of the secondary that received great praise was perhaps the standout star of Saturday’s defensive effort, senior safety Evan Fields. The fourth-year Sun Devil recorded 17 tackles and forced two fumbles, the latter of which looked to seal the victory for ASU with only six minutes remaining on the clock.

Last year, Fields played the now-defunct “Tillman” position in former DC Danny Gonzales’s 3-3-5 look, and while the safety performed somewhat well in that role, he made the return to his more natural role guarding half of the field in the new 4-3 look under Pierce and Lewis.

“I’m glad we finally got him back in as a half-field safety, a quarter safety. What you see out there is a missile,” Pierce said emphatically. “There were some loud collisions with (Fields) involved; he was flying around. I don’t think I’ve ever been a part of a game where a defensive back had that many tackles, physical tackles.”

Pierce also spoke to Fields’s comfortability in his new role within the defense.

“(In 2018 and 2019) he was playing the “Tillman” in the Danny (Gonzales) defense, so he was involved in the running game, half-field, all over the place. Now he knows his role is detailed for him each and every week. His eyes are clean; he played fast; he anticipated what was going on. I think he’s become a better student of the game. You can look at his notepad throughout the week, and it's full. He's now taking that next step. And hopefully, it continues because the way he played along with that,” the ASU co-defensive coordinator said.

The final player Pierce praised on Wednesday is a part of the Sun Devil linebacker trio, junior Merlin Robertson. The 2018 Pac-12 Defensive Freshman of the Year looked as if he returned to his younger, rejuvenated state that was greatly missed after a subpar sophomore season in maroon and gold. Robertson racked up 10 tackles, including a massive fourth-down stop in the red zone after careening off the edge into the backfield. Robertson also made a freakishly athletic interception catch on what looked to be a surefire completion from Slovis at the end of the first half.

For Pierce, seeing Robertson flourish after a sophomore campaign that wasn’t up to par with either of the men’s standards was the payoff of a journey that began in The Tony The Tiger Sun Bowl on Dec. 31 against Florida State in El Paso.

“We were extremely excited and fired up every time he made a play because (Robertson’s journey) came to fruition,” Pierce described. “It’s not (just) about the talk like coach (Herm Edwards) says it’s words and action. Merlin put it (all out) on the field; he played his tail off. That was a game that he needed for his confidence to prove that not to everybody else, but to himself, that the work he did on and off the field. (He proved) he could show it to everybody.”

Along with discussing Robertson’s growth and how Saturday was a proving ground for him, Pierce also stressed his third-year linebacker standout’s value to the team as a whole.

“Hopefully this year, he helps us win more games and plays like he’s playing because when he plays like that, he brings a certain energy and passion and mentality to our team…There’s a physical presence (to him), Merlin makes those game-changing moments, and you saw it on Saturday.”

With the presence of players like Lucas, Fields and Robertson paired with the lessons displayed from the USC loss, Pierce and Lewis’ defensive group has a good footing on where they stand as a group heading into a matchup with a Golden Bears team that shows a slight resemblance to the offense of the Trojans.

“We expect them to throw the ball and be able to run it, they have a very talented running back who does an outstanding job,” Pierce mentioned. “Their offensive line is a veteran group as well, and they have big receivers on the outside, no different than what we saw last week, so we expect to play.”

With Pierce, Lewis, Edwards, and a surplus of assistant coaches with NFL experience, ASU has gone all-in on creating a program that is the “pro model,” an approach that has paid dividends at the facilities, on the field and through the recruiting process. However, ASU’s opponent this week also pulls on NFL experience, adding more kindling to a fiery home opener in Tempe.

In January, Cal announced the hiring of a new offensive coordinator ahead of the 2020 season, a great football mind in Bill Musgrave, who brings 20 years of NFL experience to Berkeley.

Musgrave’s two decades in the NFL overlapped with the careers of ASU’s DC’s, with Pierce facilitating a nine-year span as a player and Lewis’s 16-year coaching tenure. With the matchup against Musgrave looming on Saturday night, Pierce spoke to the challenge of thwarting an offense led by an experienced NFL mind.

“Obviously, you have to look at what he did with the Denver Broncos and in the past teams that he was with in the National Football League,” Pierce referenced. “Like everybody, you keep a resume profile of every coordinator that you go up against. So, we've been studying him of that. There's a lot of data counted as well; offensively with their quarterback and their system they had last year, I'm sure there'll be some carryover.”

Despite the advanced look and analysis of Musgrave and the Cal offense conducted by ASU’s NFL minds, Pierce maintained his defense’s accountability on improving and doing the little things to pave the way to success.

“Like all coaches say, it's very cliche; it's all about us,” Pierce stated. “(We have to) execute like we had to do last week and finish games and get off the field on third and fourth downs. That's the most important part about this ASU defense, is to take care of ourselves.”

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