Fans of Arizona State basketball must feel like the program has jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire transitioning from the Pac-12 to the Big 12. The Sun Devils have not put their best foot forward to begin their first-ever campaign in arguably the toughest conference in the sport.
At 10-6, a once promising start to the 2024-25 season has devolved into a potential death spiral in the conference standings. Tuesday night the Sun Devils lost 95-89 to a tough UCF squad in a game that saw ASU go on a 16-0 run in the second half only to squander the lead in the final minutes.
Head coach Bobby Hurley has now seen his team lose five of its last seven games, including three straight in Big 12 play. That's not the consistency fans expected with him at the helm of a brand new, loaded roster.
Will Bobby Hurley survive the season if ASU can't turn things around in the Big 12?
With superstars like freshmen Jayden Quaintance and Joson Sanon joining this year and veteran pieces like Basheer Jihad and BJ Freeman in the starting five, ASU should be competing like a new powerhouse. Instead, it just had UCF's Keyshawn Hall drop 40 points on it at home in what felt like a must-win game.
Hurley can recruit, nobody's denying that, but at what point is that worth nothing to the program if the roster can't gel and produce winning results. ASU has seen itself in three NCAA tournaments since he took over in 2015 but never any farther than the first round.
Five-star recruits are flashy and full of hope but at some point the team has got to win games and a lot of them. If this season continues to go off the rails, it wouldn't be surprising to see Quaintance (a projected NBA lottery pick) transfer out to a program where he can bolster his draft stock significantly.
ASU can no longer afford to be a way-station for promising talent, at some point it needs to be the Sun Devils who put together juggernauts and go on title runs. Can Hurley do that? That question needs an answer soon lest the basketball team go the way of the football program pre-Kenny Dillingham.