ASU football was closing within a single touchdown of catching Cincinnati in the fourth quarter twice, but the kicking woes surrounding the program this season came back to bite them yet again.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!From 48 and 41 yards away, Ian Hershey scuffed two attempts nowhere near the uprights when his team was down 24-14. While the offense didn’t give him any favors from getting within a closer distance, head coach Kenny Dillingham was confident in his kicker and decided to go to him.
The redshirt sophomore went 0-for-2 vs. the Bearcats and is just 7-for-12 on field goals in total this season, a cause for concern Dillingham plans on finding a solution before it becomes too late. Carston Kieffer is 0-for-1 so far.
When addressing the media about what his next move is in that position, Dillingham was brutally honest and announced his unique way to hopefully resolve the area of concern.
“You hope you can make a kick, but our kicking game is atrocious. If you can kick and you are at Arizona State, email me. We are gonna have kicking tryouts on Monday, so bring it on,” Dillingham said postgame. “I am dead serious, we’re going to put it out on our socials, we’re going to have a kicking tryout on Monday. We gotta find someone who can make a field goal.”
Video Credit:Â Justin LaCertosa on X/Twitter, @LaCertosaSports
Kenny Dillingham said that ASU will be hosting kicking tryouts on Monday:
"Our kicking game is atrocious. If you can kick and you're at Arizona State, email me. We're going to have kicking tryouts on Monday … I'm dead serious."@DevilsDigest pic.twitter.com/tUsrZDP4Wi
— Justin LaCertosa (@LaCertosaSports) October 19, 2024
Even though there was the option of going for it on fourth down, the Sun Devils struggled on third and fourth-down conversions already in the game and Dillingham wanted to get guaranteed points instead. ASU was 0-for-5 on third down in the first half and finished 4-for-12. When it was fourth down, Arizona State was unsuccessful on both tries, 0-for-2.
As time was dwindling down and with no timeouts remaining, a successful kick could have changed the trajectory of the result. But with Hershey’s squandered opportunities, Cincinnati’s defensive game plan thwarted any hope of Arizona State coming back.
Acknowledging how poor the kicking has been and not having any consistency in that part of the roster, Dillingham didn’t want to risk losing the ball with a turnover on downs.
“In that scenario when you are down 10, it’s hard to go for it because going for it doesn’t guarantee you points. It’s hard to go for it in that scenario of the game with such limited time when you aren’t guaranteed points,” Dillingham said. “For me, you would hope you make a kick. We missed five kicks in the past three games, so how am I going to fix it? We got to find somebody who can kick it. We have to give Kieffer more chances as well, but we have to find more guys and try to find someone else that can kick.”
It was a frustrating loss with just two rushing touchdowns from Cam Skattebo and starting quarterback Sam Leavitt was out injured despite the defense doing its best to keep the score close. Keith Abney II collected an interception, C.J. Fite came up with a vital end zone stop and the unit as a whole was steady for the most part.
There are no further details on the tryout itself, but it will be interesting to see how it plays out and if there is a new addition to the Sun Devils roster as the program heads into its second bye week.
ASU’s defensive resilience overshadowed by poor offense, fall to Cincinnati 24-14
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Reporter Alec Cipollini covers the Phoenix Mercury, Suns and ASU Athletics for Burn City Sports. You can follow him on his X account, @AlecCipollini
