2 years later, BYU football seeks redemption against Arizona State

PROVO — Nearly two years after losing a road game to Arizona State, which sunk the team's College Football Playoff hopes, BYU will finally have the opportunity to face the Sun Devils again.

A lot has changed in the two years since the teams last met on the gridiron, with players on both sides having gone onto the NFL or transferred schools. But a few still remain from that 2024 game.

Arizona State no longer has its offensive trio that previously wreaked havoc against the Cougars — Sam Leavitt is now at LSU, and Cam Skattebo and Jordyn Tyson are in the NFL.

Notable BYU players who were around in the last matchup include LJ Martin — who is still out with an injury — Isaiah Glasker, Raider Damuni, Evan Johnson, Sione Moa, Jojo Phillips and Tommy Prassas.

Many will remember the wild ending in Tempe in November, when Sun Devil fans rushed the field. The fans thought the game was over after Leavitt had thrown a pass up and out of bounds on fourth down to seemingly use up all of the clock. After review, it was determined there was one second remaining, giving the Cougars one final chance at a Hail Mary.

In the midst of the field rush stood Arizona State head coach Dillingham, angered and confused about how there was one second left. Dillingham could not believe there was still time on the clock and a sea of fans probably did not help him keep his cool.

After finally clearing the field of fans, BYU ran one final play that came up short, giving the Sun Devils the win and another field storm.

Dillingham was asked about the end of that game ahead of the rematch this week, sayin, "How I acted was not OK."

Finally, after two years, these two teams will play each other with a lot on the line for the Cougars, once again.

"I've known Kenny Dillingham for a long time and have a lot of respect for him and the way he runs things," BYU head coach Kalani Sitake said. "They have a really good team; and you look at what they were able to do last weekend, they have some momentum and we've got to gain some."

Arizona State is coming off a 28-17 win over Kansas State, but Dillingham will turn to true freshman quarterback Jake Fette this week. Senior quarterback Mikey Keene suffered a knee injury against the Wildcats and the previous starter, Cutter Boley, had already been benched for his play on the field.

Fette has only appeared in two games this season, so the Cougars will have limited film on him.

"They got the best of us in a heartbreaker, and so that still is in the back of our minds," Damuni said. "We want to go out, and we want to put out our best performance."

Arizona State leads the all-time series against BYU with a record of 21-8, with BYU's last win in the series coming in 2021 when Tyler Allgeier had his famous punch out forced fumble.

"They're a good team," Moa said. "They're fundamentally sound, and they're well coached. We had a heartbreaker a couple of years ago, my freshman year, and so we still have that chip on our shoulder."

Not only will the Cougars be looking to get some revenge for the 2024 loss to the Sun Devils, but BYU is also looking to get back on track after suffering its first loss of the season against UCF last week.

Some of the issues that plagued the Cougars against the Knights could present itself again with the way Arizona State likes to play. Similarly to UCF, the Sun Devils like to play with speed and will also be rolling out a backup quarterback for the Halloween matchup.

"When everyone's trying to do more than their job, we get in trouble and we even cut each other off," Sitake said. "UCF did a great job finding and exposing some of the issues."

If BYU doesn't want things to get spooked for the second straight week, they'll need to make sure they have a much better tackling performance than they did a week ago.

"We've got to be better tacklers," Sitake said. "Work on tackling and working on body position and coming to balance and leveraging and spilling the right way."

But there's only so much Sitake and the coaching staff can do on the sidelines, with Damuni saying it's up to the players to make the plays they're supposed to make.

"You just go into practice, you rep it out," Raider Damuni said. "You go and you do drills, tackling drills. It's just a lack of execution, and we know what we have to do to be better."

Arizona State wide receiver Reed Harris has caused problems for opposing defenses all season, and with star cornerback Evan Johnson likely out, the Cougars will need to pay even more attention to Harris, who is a Boston College transfer with 47 catches for 800 yards and eight touchdowns. Harris possesses great size and frame, standing at 6-foot-5 and 220 pounds.

He also presents a challenge for a BYU defense that struggled to finish tackles and contain explosive plays against the Knights. With more injuries in the secondary, the Cougars will need other players to step up and limit Harris from getting downfield.

After suffering its first loss of the season, BYU has little time to dwell on what went wrong against UCF. The Cougars now face an Arizona State team that presents similar challenges but also brings back memories of one of the most painful losses in recent memory.

BYU has a chance to get back on track at home against the Sun Devils; but in order to do so, the Cougars will need to clean up the mistakes that cost them last week and deliver a much more disciplined performance on both sides of the ball.

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