Sun Devil Magic: From last to first
By Christian Jarmark ·
Sun Devil Magic: From last to first
by Christian Jarmark, Cronkite News
November 9, 2026
(Audio by Christian Jarmark/Cronkite News)Arizona State entered its first season in the Big 12 after back-to-back 3-9 seasons and was picked to finish 16th out of 16 teams in the conference preseason media poll.
The Sun Devils started strong before a road loss to Cincinnati dropped them to 5-2. That’s when the improbable run began.
ASU won its final five regular-season games, including victories over ranked Kansas State and BYU. The BYU game produced one of the strangest finishes of the season when fans stormed the field believing the game was over, only for officials to put one second back on the clock. After the field was cleared and BYU’s final play came up short, fans stormed the field again.
The Sun Devils then advanced to the Big 12 Championship, where they earned their third ranked win in four games by beating No. 16 Iowa State 45-19.
The victory gave ASU the Big 12 title in its first season in the conference and earned the Sun Devils a spot in the College Football Playoff.
TRANSCRIPT
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Christian Jarmark: The 2024 Arizona State football season was a special one here in the Valley. Coming off back-to-back three and nine seasons and entering their first season in the Big 12, the expectations were low. So low, in fact, that the Sun Devils were picked to finish 16 out of 16 teams in the Big 12 preseason poll, a poll that now no longer exists.
Following the Herm Edwards era, the Sun Devils turned to a 33-year-old first-time head coach in Kenny Dillingham, who looked like he may be in over his head after year one. And yet, despite all of that, the Sun Devils reached the pinnacle of the college football world in 2024.
I'm Christian Jarmark, and I'm the host of Sun Devil Magic, a three-part series that takes a look back at both the Sun Devils' success on the field that year and the community and fanbase it reinvigorated around it.
The Sun Devils' journey to a Big 12 championship and eventual college football playoff appearance was not a typical one. The catalyst of that run was head coach Kenny Dillingham, a former ASU grad. Lead editor at Devil's Digest, Hode Rubino, sat down with me and talked about the fiery head coach.
Hod Rabino: That's why Kenny Dillingham really was the best hire, because just to hire another mercenary that, okay, could clean up things after Herm Edwards, stay here for two, three years, and just look at ASU as a stepping stone, assuming he's done well in those two, three years, to a bigger and sexier job. That's not what ASU needed. ASU needed somebody that's going to be here for the long haul, that always talks about being born and raised a Sun Devil. His family, his wife's family are here. He has no desire to pick up and leave.
Christian Jarmark: Dillingham got the nod to become ASU's 24th non-interim head football coach in program history in 2023. And in just that first year, the Sun Devils faced a one-year bull ban for NCAA rules violations during the previous regime under Herm Edwards. The Sun Devils struggled to even field the competitive team that first year and ended up taking losses to Fresno State and Colorado, along with losing a 55-3 to Rivals Utah.
Kenny Dillingham: What was the score? 55-3. One more time? 55-3, yeah. Yeah, we're just, you know, year two. You know, like I said, last year we didn't have any depth. We couldn't practice. I mean, we were a 7-on-7 team, you know, pretty much the entire year, and we gradually just got worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. Which is unfortunate in year one because you should be trying to get better, but if you wanted to field a team last year, that's the only way we could.
Christian Jarmark: That was head coach Kenny Dillingham at a press conference via Sun Devil Athletics. Now entering 2024, Arizona State brought in more than 30 new transfer players to try and bolster their roster. including starting quarterback Sam Leavitt. Levitt paired along with running back Cam Skattebo and wide receiver Jordyn Tyson, who were both transfers to ASU the year prior.
The three of them made one of the most explosive offensive trios in the country and one that Arizona State fans had never seen before. Former Cronkite graduate and Fox 10 Phoenix multi-media journalist Blake Nieman talked to me about the trio.
Blake Nieman: Well, the comradery was very close. I will say from I have both personal relationships with Sam, Cam and Jordan. And knowing all of them, they I mean, Sam and Jordan would work together consistently after practice and through the offseason. They would consistently get together. Cam was really tough on Sam. Cam would get after Sam. He would yell at him in practice. He would bicker at him. He would really hold him accountable.
Christian Jarmark: All that accountability paid off right from the jump, because in just Levitt's first three starts, the Sun Devils matched the win totals of the two seasons prior, with their first 3-0 start since Jaden Daniels' freshman season in 2019. With Leavitt throwing for over 245 yards in two of the first three games, while Skattebo announced himself to ASU fans and the Valley as a whole, with just under 300 scrimmage yards in Week 2 vs. Mississippi State.
Despite that, America wasn't ready to take full notice of Skattebo and the Sun Devils just yet. As conference play still loomed large, no one knew what to expect in ASU's first season in the Big 12. The Sun Devils then immediately stumbled out of the gate, dropping their first conference game at Texas Tech.
So was this hot start in non-conference play just a fluke under the young Dillingham? Or did the Sun Devils have what it takes to make a run?
Blake Nieman: Like you said, very low expectations. The media poll had ASU pick dead last to finish dead last in the conference, coming off back-to-back three and nine seasons. Not a lot of energy coming into the year. And then slowly but surely, even into the early part of the season, I wasn't really confident things were going to take a turn. I mean, they had that loss at Texas Tech early in the season. And then they started to stack up some wins, get some wins at home. And then the turning point kind of happened when they beat Oklahoma State on the road.
Christian Jarmark: Entering the Sun Devils Week 9 game at Oklahoma State, ASU had rattled off two wins in three of its previous Big 12 matchups, including the first of two and a half field stormings. We'll get to that later. With a ranked win over Utah, along with beating Kansas for the program's first Big 12 win. That meant the Sun Devils entered the matchup with Oklahoma State at 5-2 and likely needing to win out to have any chance at a conference title.
Blake Nieman: I was at that game on the road. It was a rainstorm, two-hour delay, and then they got bowl eligibility. And the guys were celebrating that. I mean, getting bowl eligibility, that was double the win total for ASU over the past couple of seasons. I mean, it matched the amount of wins they got over two seasons combined. And then it got to the Kansas State game, and that's where I think people started to like, whoa.
Christian Jarmark: The Kansas State game was the true coming out party for Levitt and Tyson, as the duo connected for 176 yards and two of Levitt's three passing touchdowns. They looked unstoppable heading into the final two-game stretch of the season against No. 14 BYU and in-state Southern rivals Arizona.
Blake Nieman: And you follow that up with the BYU upset at home, double field storm, just a truly magical season. And then at that point, ASU controlled their own destiny against U of A, stomp U of A, make it to the Big 12 championship.
Christian Jarmark: The BYU game produced one of the wildest finishes in ASU history. ASU fans stormed the field thinking the game was over, only for officials to put one second back on the clock. After the field was cleared, BYU got one final Hail Mary. The pass was caught, but Chase Roberts was brought down two yards short of the end zone.
Following the 49-7 bus stomping of U of A, the Sun Devils had a trip booked for Jerry's World, also known as AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, where they would take on now Penn State head coach Matt Campbell and his Iowa State Cyclones, where they would give them a Sun Devils beatdown of their own in a 45-19 victory.
ASU had finally reached the top of the mountain, despite the low preseason expectations, despite dropping their first conference game, despite losing two of their first seven games, and despite having to go on a six-game winning streak that included three ranked opponents to do it.
The odds were always stacked against Dillingham and the Sun Devils, and when most people had written them off, Dillingham did what he does best. And the great words of NFL quarterback Geno Smith, he didn't write back. I talked with lead editor for Sun Devil Source, Chris Karpman, to talk about what it took to get there.
Chris Karpman: Most importantly, just the amount of improvement that that team demonstrated from the beginning of the season through the end. It's ironic in some ways, that team was 2-2 in the Big 12 in that season. You'll remember ASU lost to Cincinnati. Kenny Dillingham was calling for student tryouts to fix his special teams.
ASU had barely beaten Texas State a few weeks earlier. Nobody thought ASU was going to then win the rest of its regular season games and make it to the Big 12 championship. I think that team had a lot of things that were bette than what we've seen this year so i'm not necessarily comparing it, but I think just like how much that those players poured in to the experience and how much better that they got and their ability to avoid the landmines that a team can step on.
Christian Jarmark: Once again this is Sun Devil Magic hosted by Christian Jarmark for Cronkite Sports. That was episode one of a three-part series that takes a look back at both the Sun Devil success on the field that year and the community and fan base it uplifted around it.
In the next episode, we will take a look at how the success on the field turned into success off the field for local businesses and communities, as well as the pinnacle of the season, the Peach Bowl, in episode three.
So join me next time for Sun Devil Magic. I'm Christian Jarmark, and thank you for listening.
This article first appeared on Cronkite News and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Originally published by Cronkite News Sports
