NIL
Sam Leavitt, Jordyn Tyson save ASU’s season against Texas Tech
Maybe it takes a giant to wake a giant?
Arizona State’s 26-22 victory over No. 7 Texas Tech at Mountain America Stadium on Oct. 18 was the kind of win a program needs to get into the top tier of college football and stay there.
“That was unbelievable,” Kenny Dilliham said. “From start to finish, it was absolutely unbelievable what they did out there.”
What ASU (5-2, 3-1 Big 12) did out there was stop a team that came in averaging 47.5 points per game. Texas Tech (6-1, 3-1) finished with 22 points, by far the lowest output of the season. The Red Raiders only had seven at halftime.
What ASU did out there was score 26 points on a team that hadn’t allowed more than 17 all year.
What ASU did out there was take, maintain, lose and regain a lead on a team that hadn’t trailed at any point in any game this season.
But most of all, what ASU did out there was knock off a team made up of the finest transfers $28 million can buy.
“Everybody builds programs different ways,” Dillingham said.
Texas Tech, funded by Cody Campbell, a Texas Tech offensive lineman-turned-billionaire oil tycoon, is the second-highest priced program in the nation, according to NIL watchdog On3. (The Texas Longhorns are first.)
ASU’s exact player spending through the Sun Angel NIL collective for this season isn’t known.
The average Big 12 program spent $7.2 million in 2024, the most recent numbers available in a recent NIL-NCAA report.
That report showed that ASU spent about $5.7 million last year.
“The way you build programs is sooooo different nowadays,” Dillingham said, repeating himself for emphasis. (And boosters, donors and supporters had better pay attention. A spending gap like that could leave ASU on the outskirts of big-time college football, if it keeps up too long.)
ASU is finally yawning after years of wearing the ”sleeping giant” label.
It was a fourth-consecutive sellout at Mountain America Stadium, nearly 54,000 screaming, sweating Sun Devils, minus a few hundred dressed in scarlet and cheering the Red Raiders.
It was the 10th consecutive home win, keeping intact ASU’s perfect home record in Big 12 games.
And it was a show put on by the program’s best players.
Preseason Heisman candidate Sam Leavitt threw for 319 yards and a touchdown.
Jordyn Tyson, the nation’s best receiver, had 10 catches for 105 yards and a touchdown. And of course, Tyson found the end zone; he’s had a touchdown in every game this season. (Yes, even Utah, where he scored ASU’s only touchdown by running the ball in, rather than catching it.)
All of this show, by the way, was for some of ASU’s top recruits who were at Mountain America Stadium for the game.
As Leavitt said after the game, things start clicking when the Sun Devils know they have to win.
The Sun Devils did have to win if they were going to save their season.
ASU took a huge loss at Utah on Oct. 11 — a defeat players and coaches called “embarrassing.”
Another Big 12 loss would make it hard to repeat as conference champions.
A loss to another top 25 team would damage ASU’s College Football Playoff potential.
But mostly, a second consecutive loss in a big game with the opportunity to put the conference in a chokehold would have damaged the program’s credibility.
The Sun Devils are trying to prove last year wasn’t just a sparky.
Every win is momentum toward proving the “sleeping giant” finally got some magic beans.
The Sun Devils are almost through their Texas rodeo with wins over Texas State, TCU, Baylor and, now, Texas Tech. A one-loss Houston Cougars team is coming to Tempe on Oct. 25.,
Dillingham knows what’s at stake.
He also knows there’s only one way to get where they’re going.
“You win,” Dillingham said. “It’s very simple. If you just win, everything takes care of itself. And how do you win? You get better every single day.”
Reach Moore at gmoore@azcentral.com or 602-444-2236. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @SayingMoore, Instagram, @SayingMoore, and TikTok, @SayingMoore.
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