With two programs on opposite ends of the win-loss spectrum, the outcome in Tempe on Saturday wasn’t unexpected, but the way it was achieved came in outright destruction little could have foreseen. In a program-making statement, the ‘Cats marked their territory, retaining custody of the Territorial Cup, as Arizona bludgeoned ASU, 59-23.
It wasn’t exactly the 70-7 scoreline of 2020, but the embarrassment in such a lopsided defeat falls on ASU this year after they were the ones who left their rival emasculated on their home field four years ago. In a flip of the script from that matchup, Arizona was the dominant force in this edition, racking up six consecutive scoring drives to open up the ballgame before finishing with 59 points and 619 yards of total offense on the day. Although ASU’s collective performance would improve in the second half, their self-dug hole was too deep even to see the daylight of a possible comeback.
“Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom to bounce back up,” Dillingham said. “It’s painful to sit up here and lose. I hate it.”
“We didn’t come out on top, and that’s all that matters,” Jalin Conyers added. “It sucks.”
“I’m embarrassed,” senior Jordan Clark noted. “Pissed off.”
From each team’s first drive, one wouldn’t be remiss that another classic was on hand in the 2023 dual in the desert. After holding the Wildcats to a field goal on their opening drive, Arizona State marched down the field with direct snap runs from non-quarterbacks. As shown in recent weeks, Cam Skattebo and Jalin Conyers took designed runs on this drive and would gain all 75 yards as ASU’s first series culminated in a Skattebo scamper to give ASU a 7-3 lead early. Despite becoming a staple of Dillingham’s offensive gameplan as of late, it came highly unexpected considering the impending return of his original starter.
Having been out of action with an injury since Week 2, highly-touted freshman quarterback Jaden Rashada returned to the field on Saturday, only after Conyers and Skattebo started the show. Having been demoted from the starter for being late to a team meeting this week, the committee was established not only in Rashada’s wake but also in the absence of Trenton Bourguet, who was a gameday scratch due to an illness.
Even with the QB carousel, the Sun Devils were still the first team in the end zone. But in response to ASU’s first shot, Arizona took to the air and fired back, over and over again.
Having stepped in under center for the Wildcats midseason, Arizona quarterback Noah Fifita balled out in his first Territorial Cup appearance. After going down 7-3, the Arizona offense ran up and down Frank Kush Field, scoring touchdowns on five straight drives. In this stretch, Arizona State defenders were utterly befuddled by the Arizona passing game as the redshirt freshman threw circles around a secondary that struggled for the second week in a row. For Dillingham. The team’s inability to create a pass rush and make Fifita uncomfortable in the pocket essentially left the secondary out to dry on Saturday.
“We couldn’t create a pass rush with four,” Dillingham noted. “If you can’t create a pass rush with four, and you play good wideouts, it’s hard. All year, pass rush has been one of our top things. Early in the year, we were able to scheme up more pass-rush pressures. But at the end of the year, teams just said no and let two or three guys get into route combinations, max-pro, and play that game.”
The largest wounds on defense would be inflicted by Arizona’s Tetairoa McMillan, who brought in 11 catches for a single-game record in receiving yards in Arizona school history and the Territorial Cup series. With his top target leaving defenders in the dust, along with a 100-yard game from Jacob Cowing as well, Fifita would light a torch on ASU’s defense throughout the first half, throwing for 357 yards (his 527 in total would set a new Territorial Cup record) and two touchdowns (five overall) to open up a monstrous 38-7 lead at halftime.
“Those wideouts are good, and they got open,” Dillingham said. “Simple as that. You give a good quarterback enough time to send two NFL wideouts down the field, and you can’t hit him; they’re gonna get open.”
Facing near insurmountable odds out of the break, in typical Dillingham fashion, Arizona State didn’t throw in the towel. Call it the nature of the rivalry or Arizona coming off the gas pedal, but the Sun Devils kept playing until the clock read triple zeroes in the fourth quarter. Scoring twice in the second half and cutting down the points allowed from 38 to 21, ASU showed a fight that nobody on the home sideline was surprised to see.
“The biggest thing was coming out with fight,” Tre Brown emphasized. “We relayed the message that we would come out and fight no matter the score. We were gonna play football. For the guys that this is their last time on the field, we’re gonna give it all.”
“We aren’t gonna quit,” Conyers threw in. “We could’ve just sat there and let them put up as many points as they can. I don’t think it’s in anyone’s DNA in this team to give up and quit, be done, and lose as bad as they did a couple of years ago.”
At the head of the effort was the freshman quarterback. Despite not playing since early September, Rashada stepped in and led the offense to two second-half scores. While the rest of his stat line won’t pop out at anyone, his level of care in the program from his performance and his commitment to the program was evident to the team.
“It’s hard not to play in nine games and then come in and play the biggest rivalry game of your life,” Conyers said of Rashada. “Props to him for preparing all week and doing a good job. It’s hard. It’d be hard for any true freshman quarterback to do that after not playing in nine games.”
“He’s a Sun Devil,” Dillingham said with appreciation. “He’s passionate about this palace, and I have confidence in him moving forward.”
Although ASU played with valor in the second half to lighten the magnitude of the defeat, the 59-23 scoreline tells one all they need to know. The defeat on rivalry week marks the beginning and end of respective eras. Kenny Dillingham’s first year as the head coach of the Sun Devils is in the books following the loss, which pushes Arizona’s all-time advantage in the rivalry to 51-45-1.
What Dillingham won’t have a chance to change in the future is in the conference, as Arizona State football concludes its final season as a member of the Pac-12, a conference it has been a part of since 1978. For an ASU lifer like Dillingham, the defeat to Arizona is bitter enough, and going out of a conference he grew up watching only makes the pain worse. Still, the lessons learned from such high-level competition as a first-year head coach are things he will take with him to the Big 12 next year.
“This is arguably the best Pac-12 has been since the USC era of Matt Leinart and Reggie Bush,” Dillingham mentioned. “I think we faced a very difficult schedule, when you truly look at, because of how deep the Pac-12 is. It’s only gonna chalice us moving forward. I didn’t take this job and expect to go win eight games. The buy-in, what we’re doing, the direction we’re going, is the direction that needs to be headed. It’s what needed to be done this year. Even though it’s not fun to lose games like this, sometimes it’s needed.”
Even with the sentiment of another 3-9 season with a loss to its rival, what Dillingham has begun to build in Tempe gained traction throughout the year, and that’s a culture to eventually restore the tradition of a winning program in the valley.
“We won the same amount of games we won last year,” Dillingham noted. “Through all the adversity we faced, we didn’t get worse. Through the craziest year I’ve ever been a part of…our guys didn’t flinch. Everybody out of this room looks at this year and is like it’s a failure. That’s one of the worst junior and senior classes that have ever come through ASU.
“But the people in this room are gonna look at this room, and I’m gonna look at this room as the people who set the foundation for where we’re going…Once this place gets rocking, it’ll never fall again.”
