As he sat down at the podium following another dominant Sun Devil win, senior cornerback Jack Jones asked media members what the cumulative rushing yardage was for the Stanford Cardinal. Informed that Arizona State’s defense held Stanford to just nine rushing yards Friday night, Jones joyously responded by dapping up senior defensive end Tyler Johnson.
“Unbelievable,” Jones remarked of the Sun Devils’ performance before leaning back in his chair with a grin from ear to ear. “That’s unbelievable.”
From the start, Stanford’s pass-happy offense favored the air over the ground in its offensive game plan against defensive coordinator Antonio Pierce’s unit.
“They made it a 7-on-7 game which was a little shocking,” Pierce told reporters following the third Pac-12 win of the season for ASU. “I didn’t expect that. But our guys responded.”
Despite a young Sun Devil defensive line having to dig deeper into the depth chart with defensive end Michael Matus out with an injury – to go along with Jermayne Lole and Travez Moore’s season-ending injuries – the Cardinal still lacked the ability to run the ball effectively.
“I think it was a compliment to us that they didn’t want to run the ball,” said Pierce. With a freshman quarterback on the road against a conference opponent, the Cardinal opted to throw the ball 45 times, gaining 356 yards through the air. Both Stanford running backs carried the ball seven times, with Nathaniel Peat and Austin Jones combining for 45 yards on 14 carries. “They didn’t want to run the ball. And then when they decided to, they couldn’t. That’s a compliment to us. We’ve just gotta keep playing that way. Our mindset is to stop the run, be dominant in the run and then give ourselves the opportunity to have some third-and-longs and be able to call the calls that we want to call.”
Meanwhile, Arizona State’s offense took the opposite approach. Matched up with a Stanford defense that pales in comparison to the Cardinal of old when it comes to stopping the run, offensive coordinator Zak Hill allowed the Sun Devils to establish the ground game early and often. On the opening drive of the game, junior quarterback Jayden Daniels scrambled up the middle, weaving around Stanford defenders on a 51-yard touchdown run, the third score with his legs of the season and second-longest run of his career.
Under Herm Edwards, the Sun Devils have preferred to score via the ground game. Edwards’ belief in ball security – and specifically not throwing the ball around in the tight corridors of the red zone – has lent itself to a run-heavy approach when the ASU advances deep into opponent territory. Friday night against the Cardinal was no different as each of the three offensive touchdowns for Edwards’ squad came via the rushing attack.
“I thought we did some good things in the game as far as running the ball,” said Edwards, as the Sun Devils improved to 11-1 in his time in Tempe when they accumulated over 200 yards rushing. En route to the 28-10 win, the Sun Devils averaged 5.8 yards per carry. Stanford averaged just 0.5 yards in the same category. “That was our emphasis. We tried to run the ball a little more and make some first downs because when you play Stanford, they’re a very methodical football team.”
Twice, Arizona State featured a new speed option look which gave Daniels and redshirt senior running back Rachaad White options on the perimeter. The first play saw White go 29 yards, hurdling a Stanford defender to set up a first-and-goal that he would cash in on for his 10th touchdown of the year.
“Honestly, the run, it was just a great design,” White said following his 13 carry, 96-yard performance. White’s touchdown run extended his touchdown streak to eight consecutive games and gave the 6-foot-2 running back a touchdown in nine out of 10 games in maroon and gold. “It was a new play we put in just based on what the defense ran, and I can’t explain jumping over a guy. It’s just instinct and having fun.”
As has been the case frequently under Hill, Arizona State used misdirection looks to keep Stanford off guard. On ensuing plays, the Sun Devils used the deceptive formation to complete a flea-flicker pass to senior tight end Curtis Hodges for 32 yards and score a 22-yard touchdown on an end-around for freshman wide receiver Elijhah Badger.
“We added some little shift in motion and put Jayden in the gun for it,” Hill said of Badger’s touchdown, his second on three offensive touches thus far in 2021. “We felt like the misdirection stuff was going to be good for us to try to get them moving and get them out of position a little bit.”
Inexperienced defensive linemen didn’t stop the Sun Devils from getting the best of the Cardinal offensive line. The elder statesman of the defensive line, Johnson, contributed two sacks, but redshirt sophomore Anthonie Cooper turned Stanford over on downs early in the fourth quarter with ASU’s fifth sack of Tanner McKee.
“They had a lot of big guys on the edge,” said Johnson of the defensive line’s success. “We had to prepare for specific people, so the entire week we prepared for them and knowing their run game and formations, which was important in the game. It all came down to preparation.
Immediately after the turnover on downs, Hill dialed up a play-action pass designed to free up redshirt junior wide receiver Geordon Porter. The design worked just as it did the week prior for a 47-yard gain against UCLA, but an underthrown ball by Daniels could not be corralled by Porter, turning a should-be 50-yard score into a long incompletion.
Daniels’ failure to complete the deep ball left the statistical portion of the Arizona State offensive outlook more run-heavy than it likely should have been. It also left he and Hill desiring more from an ASU offense that entered Friday night, averaging 34.4 points per game.
“Really just shot ourselves in the foot on multiple drives,” Hill said, wincing when the missed opportunity to Porter was brought up postgame. The Sun Devils still finished with 430 total yards of offense after posting 463 yards in a 42-23 win a week prior in Pasadena. “In the second half, we couldn’t get it going. That was a little disheartening from a coaching standpoint. We got some good things going, and either couldn’t find ways to convert or missed a few things there at the end.”
On a night where Arizona State continued its trek toward a Pac-12 South division title, a dominant rushing performance still left the Sun Devils with a salty taste following a scoreless offensive second half.
“We came up big in our first three possessions, and we wanted to keep scoring,” Daniels said. “But that is just something; we should be finishing drives.”
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