By Jacob Seliga
Lead Writer
It’s a party on Mill Avenue like it’s 1996 Saturday night. For the first time in 28 years, the Arizona State Sun Devils have won an outright conference championship.
The Sun Devils completed the historic moment with a 45-19 thrashing of Iowa State in Saturday’s Big 12 championship game in front of a large contingent of Arizona State fans.
And after a relatively slow start, the Sun Devils flipped the switch in the middle eight, a staple of Arizona State football this year. The middle eight is a stretch of the football game that occurs during the last four minutes of the first half and the first four minutes of the second half.
With the game still tightly contested, the Sun Devils dominated the middle eight initially by forcing an errant kick by Iowa State kicker Kyle Konrardy which went wide to the left.
From there, Cam Skattebo showcased his Heisman trophy caliber ability breaking off a 53-yard run that set up a quick 4-yard touchdown just three plays later to put Arizona State up 24-10 going into halftime.
The Cyclones would receive the opening kickoff to start the second half and immediately would begin to give the game away.
Javan Robinson would blitz down from his cornerback spot and proceed to blow up Iowa State running back Abu Sama in the backfield to force a fumble.
“It was huge to get the takeaway and for the offense to score. The exciting thing was the response in the second half to come out fast. It was a few adjustments we made defensively to combat their check-with-me stuff. And the fact that our guys could go out there, take what we took at halftime, apply it, it worked, and then capitalize on it,” said Dillingham.
Immediately Skattebo would rush the Sun Devils deep into Cyclone territory where quarterback Sam Leavitt would find Xavier Guillory who would easily pull in the pass for an Arizona State touchdown.
With their backs against the wall, the Cyclones began to play desperate as Becht would drop back and throw an errant pass to Keith Abney who would jump in front of the pass and put the Sun Devils deep in Cyclone territory.
And once again the Sun Devils would quickly strike as immediately, Leavitt would find Guillory on one of the plays of the year to extend the Sun Devils lead from 14 to 28 in just 69 seconds of game time.
“I was glad I was able to run my route. We practice that every single day. That ball's in the air, it's like we already repped that thousands of times before the season started. So that was just 1,001,” said Guillory.
Sensing the game slipping away, Iowa State would begin to run the bag to try and establish ball control and to get back into a rhythm.
However, Sama for the second time in the quarter would be attacked this time from safety Shamari Simmons who would force a fumble that would be recovered by defensive lineman Justin Wodtly just past midfield.
Just as they had off of other Iowa State mistakes, the Sun Devils would make the Cyclones pay as Kenny Dillingham drawed up a screen pass that Skattebo would pull in from Leavitt and score from 33-yards out to put the dagger into the heart of Iowa State near the end of the quarter.
For Skattebo it would be his final snap of the game as he would finish with 208 total yards and three touchdowns in a game that felt like a national coming out party for a player and a team that had been under covered all year.
“I've been disrespected my whole life. I've always been the underdog. Nobody respects the fact that I'm the best running back in the country. I'm going to stand on that. If people want to disrespect that, I'm going to keep going and proving people wrong,” said Skattebo
In the span of 4:05 of game time, the Sun Devils lead ballooned from 14 to 35 leaving the Cyclones with no hope of making a comeback.
Sequences like that have defined the Sun Devils season as whenever a big play has been needed or something has needed to be done, Arizona State gets it done.
And now the Sun Devils will return home guaranteed a spot in the college football playoff for the first time in program history.
The question as to what seed they will be and who they will face is a bigger question.
With Boise State’s lackluster victory and the Sun Devils convincing one, Dillingham believes there’s precedent that should get the Sun Devils into the top four seeds with a bye.
“In the judging last year, they left a team out because of a quarterback, and I think our play, we're 11-1 with our starting quarterback having beat four ranked teams, having won the Big 12 Championship. So I do think because we've made a standard that the quarterback is that valuable, I think there should be a real chance we get a first-round bye. I definitely think we should host a game,” said Dillingham.
The final college football playoff rankings will release at 10 AM local in Tempe where the Sun Devils plan on getting together as a team to watch the rankings be release to where they’ll be able to prep for whomever their next opponent may be.
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