What to make of Arizona State’s dramatic road win over Utah
Late-game heroics from super senior guard Marreon Jackson helped Arizona State (12-16, 8-10) close out a road sweep of the mountain schools with a 63-61 victory over Utah Saturday. The win gave the Sun Devils their first sweep on the road against Colorado and Utah since the two institutions joined the Pac-12. Here are five notes from a precious conference road victory.
1. Arizona State elects to pass up last-shot opportunity again
Both games this season between the Sun Devils and Utes have come down to the final possession and wound up being decided by two points. In both games, head coach Bobby Hurley has been presented with the opportunity to have the Sun Devils hold for the final shot. Including the November loss to UC Riverside, the Sun Devils have had three games this year in which they possessed the ball inside of 30 seconds to go in the contest.
Each time, with the shot clock off, Hurley has had the Sun Devils initiate offense at some point inside 10 seconds. In both contests with the Utes, Arizona State took its shot with more than five seconds remaining. In Tempe, junior forward Jalen Graham hit his signature push-floater shot with 4.7 left on the clock when it swished through the nylon. In Salt Lake City, a downhill drive from Jackson wound up with a left-handed finish that dropped in with 6.2 seconds on the timer. In both spots, the scramble drill defense for ASU was able to deny Utah of game-winning and game-tying shot attempts.
Ironically, against UC Riverside, redshirt junior guard Luther Muhammad hit a floater with 1.7 seconds remaining on the clock. Despite it being the closest to the clock hitting zeros in the three scenarios presented, it wound up being the lone loss (although UC Riverside got a clock review to draw up a look).
2. Heath steps up in Horne’s absence
With sophomore guard DJ Horne unable to play due to an illness, Boston College transfer guard Jay Heath stepped up again, leading Arizona State in scoring for the second straight contest. With 18 points in Thursday’s win over Colorado and 20 in Saturday’s win over Utah, Heath set his ASU career-high for points in consecutive games.
The sophomore guard did so while showcasing an ability to be efficient and score within the structure of Hurley’s offense. Heath, who ranked in the top 10 of scorers in the ACC last year, was 7-for-11 from the floor and 4-for-7 from three-point range. If not for an uncharacteristically poor night from the free-throw line -- where the 80.4 percent free-throw shooter went 2-for-6 -- the scoring output would’ve been even more significant.
Setting Heath up for success was Jackson, who struggled scoring the ball with a 2 of 9 shooting night but added the game-winner and a team-high six of ASU’s 14 assists on the night to go along with six rebounds.
3. Balanced scoring attack stabilizes Arizona State
Saturday was the second consecutive game in which Arizona State produced four scorers in double figures. Notably, it was the third game in the last four on the road in which redshirt junior guard Luther Muhammad was productive as a scorer. The former Buckeye scored 10 points off the bench and was plus-10 in the admittedly flawed plus-minus statistic.
Along with Muhammad, ASU got offensive contributions from Graham and super senior forward Kimani Lawrence, who scored 15 and 10 points, respectively. Both of the Sun Devil bigs did their scoring efficiently as well, as both were above 50 percent from the floor.
As has been the case recently, the Sun Devils were great in the second half, shooting 12 of 20 as a team. Eight second-half turnovers slowed the offense down the stretch and allowed the Utes to tie the game with an 11-0 run to knot the game at 59. However, a clean first half with only three turnovers helped the Sun Devils lead 33-30 at the break despite a poor shooting start for ASU.
4. More evidence for the best Sun Devil defense in the Hurley era
There’s no doubting Arizona State’s defense has been the team’s strong suit during this season. Frequently, the Sun Devils have held opponents in the high-50s and mid-60s. On Saturday against the Utes, there were multiple stretches of over three or four minutes in which Craig Smith’s squad was unable to put the ball in the basket.
In part, ASU’s success in Salt Lake City could be attributed to its ability to avoid fouling. As a team that ranked 32nd in the country among Division 1 programs for fouls committed per game, ASU avoided putting the Utes in the bonus well into the second half. In all, ASU only committed nine fouls, a season-low for the Sun Devils.
The 61-point performance moved the Sun Devils to 32nd in KenPom’s adjusted defensive efficiency metric. That mark is the best in the program’s time with Hurley as head coach -- surpassing the 2019-20 ASU squad, which ranked 49th when the season was canceled due to COVID-19 -- and gives ASU a great shot to hang around any of the top teams in the Pac-12 Tournament in Las Vegas in two weeks.
5. Sun Devils help themselves in potentially earning a higher conference seed
Speaking of Las Vegas. ASU increased its chances for success there in two weeks and got some help along the way. With the win and Stanford’s 53-39 loss to California, ASU equaled the Cardinal with an 8-10 mark in Pac-12 play.
Stanford visits Tempe next weekend and provides Arizona State with another opportunity to move up in seeding. If the goal for ASU is to avoid Arizona for as long as possible in Las Vegas (and it should be as ASU matches up significantly better with USC and UCLA than they do the Wildcats), the best way to do so is to earn the 6 or 7 seed.
If -- and this is a relatively assumptious if -- ASU takes care of business Thursday night in a game against a Cal team that no longer has leading scorer Andre Kelly and Arizona defeats Stanford in Tucson, the Sun Devils will have a game Saturday against the Cardinal in which a win could out them at the no. 7 seed. That would be monumental toward creating any slim chances of a miraculous Pac-12 Tournament run.
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!
