Arizona State football coach Kenny Dillingham said he didn't sleep much after the team's Oct. 3 game. Poor showings on the football field can do that to a head coach.
The Sun Devils (2-2, 1-1) were 48 hours removed from an embarrassing 55-19 loss to Baylor in front of a sellout crowd at Mountain America Stadium when Dillingham met with the media on Oct. 5.
He accepted the blame for the subpar performance, just as he had after the contest wrapped up.
After watching the game over on tape, Dillingham said the biggest problem was missed assignments, which fall on him and the coaching staff.
"I always believe if players do not execute, it starts with me," he said. "If players on either side of the ball are not executing at a high enough level, my job
is to get them to execute, to get them to communicate, get them to know who they're on, get them to see the formational structural change. That is our job. That is my job."
Dillingham, in his fourth year at the helm of his alma mater, said peers reached out to him and questioned him taking so much of the blame. But he didn't back down from that core belief.
"I told some guys today, `We can get mad at you, but it's our job to get you to do the job.' I put all of that on myself," he said. "Anything that goes wrong with this program, it's funny, I got texts from people this weekend, `Hey, don't always take the blame, push the blame other places.' Bull crap. I am the head coach. And the person who said that is one of the people I consider one of my biggest mentors, and I have so much respect for the guy, but it is my responsibility to get our guys to play good football. They did not play good football. Regardless of whose fault it is, it's my fault because we didn't play good football. And I need to get them to play better football."
There are plenty of things to fix as ASU prepares for its final nonconference game of the season against Hawaii (1-4) at 7:30 p.m. MST on Saturday, Oct. 10, at Mountain America Stadium. The school's next Hall of Fame Class will be honored at halftime.
Dillingham said that Sunday is usually a voluntary workout day for the players. Attendance isn't taken because it is not a mandatory day, but he had trouble coming up with a player who wasn't in the building.
Dillingham said most of the defensive issues came down to missed assignments, which can be remedied. He also talked about the missed tackles, which hadn't been a problem in previous games. He hinted that there could be more live tackling this week in practice, although there is a fine line because live tackling increases the risk of injuries, and the Sun Devils are in a stretch where they will play nine consecutive weeks.
Simply put, Dillingham said the team wasn't on the same page.
"We thought one guy was covering one guy," Dillingham said. "The other guy thought the other guy was covering the other guy. (Baylor) did a good job of formations, mixing it up, putting some pressure on us to get it into checks and do it quickly, something they hadn't put on tape, which was good."
Dillingham said that despite the defensive issues, he saw some growth on offense. He hedged by saying it was still not up to the standard he expects or the potential he sees in his players on that side of the ball.
"We moved up and down the football field," he said. "We had some explosive plays. We just have to finish drives when we get into the red zone.
"This was the first time I watched the film and went, `Wow, what happened?' So I take it very personally to get these guys to play better."
Game time announced
Arizona State's game at Texas Tech (5-0, 2-0) on Oct. 17 will kick off at 12:30 p.m. MST and air on FOX.
Texas Tech, the defending conference champion, is coming off a 29-7 win over Colorado. It does not play this week.
Last season, ASU handed the then-No. 7 Red Raiders their only loss of the regular season, 26-22.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Kenny Dillingham doubles down on personal responsibility for loss
