Arizona State Football: How do the Devils stop Cody Kessler?

By Randy Holt | Sep 24, 2015

Even with the opposition coming off of a loss, the Arizona State Sun Devils have their work cut out for them when they host the University of Southern California Trojans on Saturday night at Sun Devil Stadium. Despite the latter’s defensive struggles this year, they bring a potent offense that could lend itself to a shootout under the lights on Saturday.

Sitting just outside the top ten in the nation, USC ranks 11th in the FBS in total offense, with 1,673 yards total thus far on the year, good for an average of 558.0 yards across their trio of tilts. That total is primarily thanks to the passing game, where the Trojans rank 12th in the country in yards per game (349.7 YPG), but even their 46th-ranked running game is no slouch, at 208 YPG. The long and short of it is that this is a team that can put points on the board at will, as evident by their 48.3 PPG, which ranks 11th in college football.

That wild success on offense starts with Cody Kessler, USC’s outstanding quarterback. Coming off of a year in which he threw 39 touchdowns against just five interceptions, Kessler has immediately come out in 2015 and built on that success. To this point in the season, he’s completed 78.7% of his pass attempts (across 89 attempts), to the tune of 922 yards. That’s good for a 307.3 YPG average. Throw in his 10 touchdowns against zero interceptions and you have one of the toughest tests that ASU may face as a defense this season.

So how do you stop him? Can you even stop him, or simply hope to contain him?

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The good news for the Arizona State defense is that they’re already in a position to defend against the pass. While the overall defensive numbers don’t paint the prettiest of pictures for ASU on the defensive side of the ball, the Devils rank ninth in the country with 134.7 yard against per game through the air. Now obviously when two of your first three games come against teams running a triple option on offense, your need to defense against the pass isn’t going to be tremendous.

Keep in mind, though, despite the loss against Texas A&M to open up the year, ASU did a solid job of containing Kyle Allen through the air, limiting him to under 200 yards, on only 57.7% passing, two touchdowns, and an interception. That same Kyle Allen has gone on to throw seven touchdowns in the two games since. Of course, on the level of Cody Kessler Kyle Allen is not. But that doesn’t mean that one can’t find optimism in that performance.

The willingness to bring pressure, perhaps more than anything, could be the key to success for the Sun Devils. The USC offensive line has already given up six sacks on the season, while the ASU defense has recorded seven (continuing to keep in mind that they faced teams that passed at the very minimum in each of the past two weeks with the triple option). Todd Graham‘s philosophy in blitzing is well-documented, and there should be no shortage of them against Kessler on Saturday night.

The Sun Devils have an experienced secondary. Armand Perry is only a sophomore, but played every game as a freshman. Jordan Simone is a staple in the ASU secondary, while Lloyd Carrington was a Bednarik Award coming into the season. When you combine the pedigree of the Sun Devil seconary, which is a legitimate strength of this team, with Todd Graham’s love for blitzing, you have a formula for success against the USC offense, as potent as it may be.

It’ll be interesting to see how the Trojans plan for the ASU defense. Perhaps the implement the run game more than we’ve seen from them this year. ASU has been susceptible to giving up big plays on the ground. But a pass-heavy attack from Cody Kessler and the Trojans could be a good thing for the Arizona State defense, who relish the opportunity to slow an elite college quarterback.

Randy Holt is the managing editor for Devils in Detail. You can follow him on Twitter @RandallPnkFloyd.

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