Arizona State Head Coach Kenny Dillingham Previewing Week 9 vs. No. 8 BYU
Monday, October 26, 2026
On line of scrimmage plan offensively and defensively:
“From the defensive side of the ball, I thought we stopped the run for the most part. We hit a few runs versus pressure where they cut us out on some of the pressures. The first drive, they cut us out on a field blitz with their left tackle. Nice job by them. We've been cut out a few times this year. We got to get better at that. Not getting cut out on those pressures, and it hasn't happened in the past. It's shown on more this year, so we talked about how to get those things fixed and try to get better from it. But as for the most part, we were around the ball. We were in the right fits on the defensive side of the ball, pretty much all night. With an occasion of one thing in the end of the middle to end of the third quarter on the goal line with the quarterback, that'd be the only other time that was when we could have been better there. And then offensively, I thought we ran the ball well in the second half. We created really good movement at left tackle and left guard to move the down line. Then at the end of the day, it's about moving people and creating good run plays. So we started to move people, and in for (ASU RB) Cardae (Mack) who has really good contact balance. He was finding holes, and lined up in some wildcat in that segment. So I think it was just a combination of things.”

On technical and executional changes from previous weeks:
“We executed the plan. Our MA (mistake) rate, we were over 80% successful plays, on offense and defense for the first time all year. Our goal is 90, so we're not there yet. Special teams, we were under the 90 as well. So I would say we were the best we've been in terms of execution. How we grade is 11 people all executing their job on the same play is checked. There's one play. If nine people boot the same call, that's still one minus for the perfect play category. Because if you can get 11 people 90-percent of the time on all three phases to play the game with perfect fundamentals and execution or great fundamentals and execution, you're probably going to win a lot of games as long as that 10-percent isn't catastrophic. So that was the best we've been, but still not to the standard that we're trying to hit.”

On the quarterback situation:
“We'll see where (ASU QB) Mikey’s (Keene) at. Mikey is honestly questionable. This is the best way to phrase it. He's not doubtful. He is questionable today, and he'll go out there, and we'll see what he does in practice tomorrow. But that's a tough competitor and a fighter, and I know he's going to want to be on the field. So we'll see what happens throughout the week. But if he's not in, it's going to be (ASU freshman QB) Jake (Fette). We'll be in, and I think regardless of who takes the field, we're going to put together a plan and we're going to practice hard, and prepare to try to go win a football game.”

On preparing a true freshman for an aggressive BYU environment:
“You can't. I mean, this is one of the best fan bases, the most consistent fan bases in college football. This is one of the best coaching staffs, in my opinion. Most consistent coaching staff from the top in college football. So I think when you have the consistency that they have as a program from the top, I think it's reaping what they show from that perspective. Going to this place is definitely one of the hardest places to play in college football. There's a reason their win percentage is so high, so I don't think there is a way to. We can play loud music, but like that's not going to prepare for the entire environment, it's going to come down to just understanding you got to do your 1/11 every single play and try to put yourself in that mode of you're on the field and try to block out everything else.”

On (ASU QB) Jake Fette expediting progression if he starts:
“Just continue to work. There's no way to expedite the progression. The progression's the progression. You just go to work as hard as you can every day and try to be the best version of yourself on Saturday. It's cliche, but it's all you can really do. But there's not like, oh, it's my time now. I just need to expedite my process. I hope we were expediting the process for the last nine months to be ready for the opportunity.” 

On (ASU QB) Mikey Keene injury:
“He got imaging, and I'm not a doctor, so I'm not going to get into the readings of the imaging. But I think questionable is good, that's what they have them as. So maybe I shouldn't say that until the report comes out. I am openly transparent, so that's bitter and sweet at the same time?”

On what was said to Jake (Fette) before he entered the game:
“It's football. You've been doing this since you were six years old. Go out there and play football. Trust your eyes, and if the read is there to slang it, slang it. If you have any doubt, hand the ball off or tuck it and be an athlete. Trust your eyes and trust what you've done since you were six years old to get yourself in this position. You're going to catch a snap, and you're going to hand it off. You're going to throw the ball like you've done since you were a little kid. There's just better players trying to take your head off. Other than that, if you know where to go with the ball it's pretty much the same. He did that on a slant route. Double slant versus mini coverage. Did an awesome job recognizing the coverage. They were trying to disguise it, throwing the ball to the number two slant, third down, and converting. He threw a fade, and he overthrew him on one that should have been a back shoulder. He came to the sideline, He's like, ‘I threw it away. I didn't like the corner's eyes’. He comes right back. He throws the back shoulder, right next drive. The way he was able to progress in the game and his communication to the sideline gave me a lot of confidence. I never really ask a quarterback, when they get to the sidelines, why didn't you throw the fade? I ask them what they see, because I want to know what was going through their head in the process, and I really liked where his head was at. I liked what he was saying. I liked what he was communicating. It means that he was looking at the stuff that we're looking at, and he's probably going to be able to get corrected like he did on the fade. That was a really nice job by him, as a young buck. 

On how much notice (ASU QB) Jake Fette was given before entering the game:
“About three, four minutes, plenty of time. We told him you got to be ready coming out of halftime. You never know what's going to happen in this half. So we told him he's got to be ready. He just looked with his little smile on his face, the Jake look, and he was confident. He's like, ‘All right, let's go’. Cutter was there supporting them. Mikey was there supporting them. The entire room is in it together, because they want to be Sun Devils, and they are Sun Devils, they're in it for ASU football to be as successful as possible. You got to appreciate that out of people, when they come together for the greater cause. All those guys were supportive of him and were trying to make him as successful as he can be. That way, we can try to win football games.”

On what positive attributes Jake Fette displayed: 
“I would say those things that I just mentioned. I liked his eyes. I liked his progress. There was one that he liked to have back, but he knew it. He came off the side, like ‘Man, I should have done this’. I'm like, yep, part of it, but you knew it. That's the thing. You saw it in real time. We didn't have to tell you. You came to the sideline and said,’Man, I should have just taken a drop and thrown it to him’. Yes, perfect. You don't get mad about that. That's part of being out there and the spur of the moment. The things he did and the way he committed in the game and communicated in the game gave me a lot of confidence in who he is. We've had a lot of confidence in him, since we recruited him. He committed here, and everybody in the country was trying to get him to visit their programs and to go to their programs, and he said, ‘No, no, no! I want to be at Arizona State because of everything that's happened in the last two years’. My response when he got here was, I'm going to protect you, and we only want to put you in the game when you're ready, to go perform at the highest level because we believe that he can be the future here.”

On the true freshmen big impact throughout season:
“I expected the guys to play a lot. I expect them to be really good players because the 2024 class was the first class without penalties. So it was the first class we were allowed to talk to on time. It was the first class we were allowed to communicate with. It was the first class where we didn't have a month of time where we couldn't speak to them. That was the least amount that we've had, so I felt like that was a very good class. I felt like that was a class that was going to help us early. There's a lot of guys helping us. We have four guys now that are essentially starters for us as true freshmen in college football in this era, in an era where everybody's playing fourth and fifth year guys. And for us to have four young pubs out there, it's really good. They're not just out there to say, ‘Great, we're starting a young guy!’ They're out there because they're playing the best and they deserve it. And so it's really fun to watch those guys get out there and compete. They all have an unbelievable energy about them, and positivity and joy for this place. So it's really fun watching.”

On Fette’s and (ASU RB) Cardae’s (Mack) chemistry on the field:
“They just have a lot of confidence. Those are two confident humans. I think it is crazy to say, ‘Oh wow! There's a chance that you have two true freshmen in the backfield together going on the road at BYU.’ It’s exciting. But if you are going to have two freshmen doing it, those are two guys that you would like to have, and then obviously you have some veterans like (ASU QB) (Jeff) Sims as well being back there with Jake and being just a calming voice as somebody who has been there and done that. I think there's a balance that's needed, but it's fun to watch those young guys go out there and play the game free and confident.”

On (ASU RB) Cardae Mack's impact to the offense:
“I think he's got really good short area quickness, really good explosiveness, and really good contact balance. He can also play wildcat because he played quarterback in high school, and I think he threw for like 2,500 yards in high school. So you could line him up back there and throw the football too. He's a guy who can do multiple things. He's not just a wildcat quarterback that runs. Like if he was in a triple option system, you could probably play him at quarterback, and he could throw the ball 10 times a game. He just adds a variety of things that make people think, 'Do we want to play cover zero when he's at quarterback?’ This dude was a quarterback. ‘Do we want to leave these guys one on one in cover zero when he's at quarterback? But zeroed out fits is the only way you can stop a quarterback direct run.’ So it just creates a really good combo for him. The fact that he can do that as a freshman, and the confidence in him taking snaps behind center as a freshman just tells you everything you need to know about Cardae Mac and the person he is. Everybody in this building has the utmost confidence in that kid to make plays and to put him back there sometimes and let him take a direct snap.” 

On how Jake’s confidence resonates with the rest of the team: 
“You could feel there was a lot of energy. Obviously, anytime a young guy gets an opportunity and  guys rally behind it. Everybody was a young guy at one point, and they all remember that first moment that they ran on the field, and they remember those moments that people cheered for him and the excitement. Everybody just wanted to help him. The best part was, I gave him a game ball after the game in the locker room, he's like, ‘I don't know why I got this. I only threw four passes’. That was his mindset, but that's why people love him. It was  in that moment, that I was trying to make his moment, and he was like, ‘I only threw four passes, guys. Thank y'all for run blocking and making plays’. That's kind of social awareness and confidence and swagger is why people get so excited.”

On what stands out about BYU’s defense:
“They're so multiple in their pass defense. They play cover two sim. They play cover two trap off pressure. They play three sim. They play cover three. They play man free. They play quarters. They play cover six, all on base downs. You don't know what you're going to get. It's very confusing because they play so many different coverages, and then they line up with three high safeties. They line up in regular odd. They line up in odd stack. They line up in four down. This is one of those teams that lines up and does so many things defensively to create chaos and to create miscommunication, and that's why they've been so successful. That's why I think Coach Taki is one of the best coaches in college football. He's been very successful on defense for a long time. I remember playing him back in the day when I was here as a GA, and I remember him having one of the better defenses. He just does a phenomenal job. Obviously, he was not at BYU then for anybody who's trying to connect that timeline.”

On when (ASU WR) Reed Harris enters the game on special teams:
“If the kicker's kicking it low, so if they get the proper lift, we're never going to successfully block it. Sometimes you face a guy who maybe has a lower trajectory or it's a longer kick. It's one of those things where sometimes the kick passes the line of scrimmage at nine and a half yards,  and if he's a half yard behind the line of scrimmage and he gets the 10, we have a chance to block it. We're just watching to see if there's enough lift on the kick and see if we can get enough push to get into the line of scrimmage, to then jump and try to bat something down.”

On first time playing BYU’s QB Bear Bachmeier:
“He does everything well. One of the first things I look at with quarterbacks is do they turn the ball over. He does not turn it over. The second thing I look at with quarterbacks is can they extend plays. He extends plays. He doesn't turn it over, he extends plays, that gives you a great chance to win right off the bat. Third thing you look at is quick and intermediate passing. Does this dude know where to go with the ball efficiently? How many sacks is he going to take? Can you get this guy taking negatives? Well, he doesn't take sacks because he knows where to go with the ball. The throwing the ball deep part, half of that is what schemes you face and when teams have given him the deep ball, he takes the deep ball. If they don't give him the deep ball, he doesn't, which is why he's so efficient. I think for him, he's really good at the things that win games, and I think that's the greatest compliment you can give a quarterback. You're good at the things that win games, and he plays his best in the biggest moments, which is why they won so many close games this year and last year with him. He plays his best in the biggest moments.”

On growth from the defense:
“I don't know if anything excites me about facing Bachmeier this weekend, but what excites me about our defense was, we were in the right fits consistently. In the right fits, we played fast. We swarmed the ball. We played with passion. We got our hands on passes. All those things showed up, and that's the level we should be playing with here. We should be better than that. We should be playing better than we are on offense as well. We're growing. We're still getting better. That's the mindset we got to have. It's still not to the standard that we want, and we just got to get better again this week at some things.”

On the run defense: 
“Obviously it’s a huge positive. Games are won and lost by usually stopping the run or running the football. There's some exceptions when you face, and this game could be an exception with their quarterback, when you face an elite gunslinger. They can just take it over, and they have that, he has that ability. But, you have to be able to stop the run. You have to be able to run the ball. That opens everything up. That allows you to be consistent in the game. Keeps you at a good down. Keeps you good down the distances. So it's absolutely critical. And hopefully we can continue that.”

On the Big 12 upsets and how college football has changed:
“It's college football nowadays. It's way different than it used to be, right? The highs, the lows, the consistency. It's a different sport. It's changed. Not a different sport, but how you build and how programs are built, and all of it is so much different. It's so much different than even three, four years ago, which is way different than 10 years ago, or eight years ago. So that's creating parity, and that's creating less undefeated teams. Somebody alluded to a coach,I don't know who said, it alluded to that in the off season. You're not going to see many undefeated teams anymore, two loss teams, are going eight and four now. It's like the NFL from that perspective because of the parity. It's just that people aren't used to that because it's different, right? Because we're changing. We're in a changing landscape. So he was just talking about the challenges. I can't remember what coach it was. And he was just talking about the challenges of managing that in this era because of the parity in the sport now, and then the ability to create consistency is harder. You have parity and the ability to create consistency is harder, and that's the challenge. It's fun to be associated with stuff that’s like, let's go play our best game this week. Repeat, repeat, and get better, and repeat, and see what happens every Saturday. But be prepared to the best of your ability.”

On freshman DL Julian Hugo’s celebration:
“I like that there were six guys around him. That's what I pointed out in the meeting, that there were six guys around him. But I don't know the move though. He's got tons of moves. I heard Blazen (ASU OL Blazen Lono-Wong). Blazen, he was getting after a little bit, and that's a positive. Blazen usually doesn't speak, so if he's showing emotion and getting excited, it has to be contagious. And he was doing that in the game, and so like I said, I thought the energy and the passion of how the guys played was to a standard. Now the question is, can they continue that? Can they continue to play with that level of passion and energy? Whether there's highs and lows, and I actually like the fact that they march down the field and score at the first drive because we've struggled responding to adversity, and for us to be able to respond, for us to get down in the third quarter and respond, that's the stuff our team needs to get better at, and for us to like show improvement there. It just shows the type of guys we have on our team, and hopefully we can just continue to fight every day, one day at a time to be the best version of us.”

On Hugo galvanizing the defense as a freshman:
“He's just playing good football. I don't look at yes, they're young and they're freshmen. That's great, but we're putting the best players on the field that we think gives us a chance to win. That's it. And we believe he gives us the best chance to win football games. He's earned the right to be on the field, and he's doing his job. He's doing it at a high level when he gets his opportunities, and you got to give him credit for that, especially as a young buck. Like I said, there's a bunch of those young bucks doing that, and the team as a whole. I love the energy and galvanization, maybe that’s the word of the whole unit that was positive, this last week from the team as a whole. Hopefully we can build upon that because we still haven't played our best game, and I'm going to continue to say that until I think we played to the level of ability that we could play at, and I don't think we did again.”

On the last matchup between ASU and BYU:
“How I acted was not okay. I was confused, rattled, confused by the communication. I just shouldn't have acted that way. So, that's probably the number one thing. All the other stuff, we didn't execute the through plays prior to the throw out of bounds. I mean, that should have been the easiest roll down, take a knee, roll down, take a knee, roll down, take a knee, throw away what you could have ever done, but it just woke me up that we have got to practice that more. Since then we've added like a little period at the end of our Thursdays where we do like a mock two minute drill or we do a mock four minute drill to make sure that we're practicing the situations that you maybe take for granted, because that could have come back as a negative on me, and that would have been 100% my fault if we didn't get that done. So I would say the learning experience for me and from both sides of it, and then just the excitement of the fan base. You know we had a dude hiding in a tent, right? I don't know if you guys remember that video of them hiding in the kicking tent. The student zipped himself in the kicking tent and then ran back out of the tunnel. Just the excitement of the community and the excitement of everybody was just awesome. Like all I remember are those moments when they do like wins and losses. I remember those specific moments where everybody is so excited. Everybody's pointing in the same direction. Everybody's fired up, and because they're rare, they don't happen all the time in college football. So you have to really embrace those moments.“

On helping mentally Fette leading up to Saturday:
“We have to have enough plays where he can just take a deep breath, where he doesn’t have to think all the time. It's like, let me just breathe, take a big breath, and whether it's throw a screen, hand off a run, line up in the Wildcat. There's a variety of things you can do to give quarterbacks breaks that that everybody in college football knows, it’s not a secret. So we just have to find ways to be able to give him a break every once in a while, and people around him have to step up. This (BYU) is one of the best teams in college football, one of the best environments in college football, one of the hardest places to play in college football, and so it's the ultimate challenge for us as a football team and definitely a challenge if Jake's the guy back there slinging around. But we're going to put the guys in the game that give us the best chance to win.”

kenny dillingham clarified the second one of these, saying cutter boley has been an awesome teammate https://t.co/E0u0JnED2L

— Damon Allred (@iamdamonallred) October 27, 2026