Bedeviled Sun Devils

The words already sound like echoes from some distant season.

Arizona State a top-10 team. A chance to play for a national championship at home in the Fiesta Bowl. And J.R. Redmond, a Heisman Trophy contender.

Some of it was a pipe dream anyway, but it all went up in smoke when the Sun Devils lost a wild, season-opening shootout against Washington, 42-38.

Hopes dashed, just like that.

Whatever embers were left were doused the next week in a 26-6 loss to Brigham Young that left the Sun Devils reeling at 0-2, their season a shambles.

A couple of fairly predictable victories over North Texas and Oregon State later, Arizona State comes to the Coliseum to play USC on Saturday as a .500 team.

“The feeling is, it feels better than the first two games,” Sun Devil cornerback Courtney Jackson said. “Morale is a lot better. As you know, we expected to be 4-0, not 2-2. After being 0-2, we’re really humble right now, even though we won the last two.”

What happened? Hype happened, in part. The Sun Devils were a surprise at 9-3 last season after losing Jake Plummer. That explosive offense fueled by Redmond--who wasn’t even a starter last season--and freshman quarterback Ryan Kealy looked great at times, and the Sun Devils beat USC and Washington State.

But Arizona State lost to Brigham Young, Washington and Arizona, and had only three defensive starters back--Jackson, safety Mitchell Freedman and tackle Albrey Battle. Did anybody really think that with an unproven defense, they might win the whole thing?

Emotions happened too.

Arizona State could have won, probably should have won, the Washington game.

“The fact we lost to them was one thing,” Coach Bruce Snyder said. “The way it happened was more devastating emotionally than the actual loss.”

The furious back-and-forth finish marked by Redmond’s stop-me-if-you-can punt returns turned on Washington’s fourth-and-17 play with 28 seconds left, when Husky quarterback Brock Huard connected with Reggie Davis on a pass good for 63 yards and a touchdown.

Davis got past cornerback Philip Brown but Freedman had a chance to tackle him. Instead, Freedman tried to strip the ball and Davis went in to score.

“I could see it unfolding,” Jackson said. “You hate that, when you can’t do anything about it and you’re on the other side of the field.

“But I had a play like that a couple of years ago in the Rose Bowl game. No single play can make the whole game. It can be the deciding factor, but it can’t shape the whole game.”

This one threatened to shape the whole season.

“I was hoping we’d rebound and play well against BYU,” Snyder said. “The team really did not respond. The BYU loss, I hope, is the low point of the season. I hope it doesn’t get any lower.”

Arizona State went back to the beginning, almost literally.

“We decided to go back to training camp and rebuild the team’s attitude,” Snyder said.

“‘Tackling, blocking, basic stuff. How to break the huddle. How to line up. How to communicate. We went back to the program’s standards. How to treat each other.

“The train’s on the track, and headed in the right direction. I don’t know if that makes us ready for USC.”

Snyder tried other things too. Concerned about a team that didn’t seem to have fresh legs, he ordered the players to back off the weightlifting early last week, and practiced without pads from the last half of Wednesday’s practice on.

Was it only coincidence that the defense gave up only a field goal against Oregon State, and held the Beavers to nine yards rushing?

Not that the problems are gone.

“We are in a castle mentality,” Snyder said. “There’s a moat around us.”

Arizona State will be trying to stop one of USC’s strengths, the Trojan receiving corps led by R. Jay Soward, with one of the Sun Devils’ weaknesses, its secondary.

Arizona State’s strength, its offense, will be going against USC’s strength, its defense.

And Arizona State outdoes USC at one of the Trojans’ weaknesses, taking penalties. The Sun Devils are the most penalized team in the Pacific 10.

How good or bad is Arizona State right now, only a month after being ranked eighth in the nation? If USC is No. 21, is unranked Arizona State close?

Can two losses ruin a season, just because they’re the first two games?

It’s all been enough to make Jackson reiterate his support for a playoff system, something he thought about two years ago, when Arizona State had a shot at the national championship but lost to Ohio State in the Rose Bowl.

He isn’t saying he thinks Arizona State would win a national championship this season, but it would keep the season from ending at Game 1. It would keep hope alive.

“I think there should be a playoff system. Sixteen teams, and let another 12 play in bowl games,” he said. “Even with the bowl championship series, until you get a playoff system, there will always be controversy.”

Interesting in theory, but a moot point for Arizona State.

“After that crazy loss to Washington, we knew it wasn’t going to be,” he said. “It was an unfortunate performance at BYU. After that, we said, ‘To hell with the national championship stuff, we’re going to go play football.’ Whoever we’re playing against, we’re going to play against them, not think about who we’d play in a bowl game.”

What goal is left this season? You’ll get no lofty talk from Jackson.

“Go into the Coliseum and play like we’re supposed to play and come out with a victory,” he said. “We can’t look any further than that. We don’t have the kind of stature right now to look at anything else.”