TEMPE- Quarterback Mikey Keene is back home, where he grew up playing and watching football.
During his high school career, he played for the Chandler High School football team, where he led the Wolves to a championship in 2019.
On Wednesday, Keene told reporters one of the reasons to transfer from Michigan to Arizona State is to have an opportunity to sharpen his skills as a potential starting quarterback.
"They told me what they told everyone, it was just a chance to compete," Keene said Wednesday. "That's all I can ask for. That's exactly why I'm here. All they needed was a chance to compete, and that sealed the deal for me."
Keene, incoming freshman Jake Fette, and Cutter Boley, a transfer from Kentucky, will be among the players who'll be competing for a starting quarterback position for the upcoming season.
The moment he met head coach Kenny Dillingham and the Sun Devils' coaching staff, he envisioned the success he's going to have on and off the field.
"He's done an awesome job," Keene said of Dillingham. "He brought the culture that he wants to ASU, and he's proud of what he's been able to build here. And I am as well, being here from this area. Super cool to see Sun Devil football back where it belongs, and then there are lots of championships every year.
"Just learning from him, and then the short amount of time that we've got because they've been recruiting and things like that. [He's] a super bright football mind [that] has a great understanding of the game and can reciprocate his understanding very easily to his players, which makes it pretty seamless to understand his system."
Keene acknowledges that there is a routine when it comes to taking an approach day by day, leading up to the first game of the season in Tempe.
He also points out that he would like to work on getting familiar with Dillingham's system, using his legs during the spring camp, and becoming a master of the offense.
"It's finding something to get yourself better every single day," Keene said. "Finding one way to get a competitive edge over yourself, over other guys around you, and other guys in the country as well, because everyone's doing the same thing that we're doing every single day.
"It's how are you going to find a different way to find a competitive edge against someone else that you're competing with that could be against yourself, that could be against whoever, whether it's recovery, whether it's more sleep, anything like that. That's how [the preparation for the season is] going."
Leading up to the fall, Keene is optimistic that the opportunities he envisions for the Sun Devils football program will materialize.