(Gif by Ben Margiott)
LOS ANGELES — "That was awesome."
Awesome (adj.): Causing feelings of fear and wonder : causing feelings of awe.
Straight from Merriam-Webster, ASU coach Todd Graham described the feelings of every fan, player, coach or alumnus of ASU and USC after a Hail Mary play that even redshirt junior quarterback Mike Bercovici described as a prayer. His prayers were similar to many Saturday night, and they were answered when redshirt junior receiver Jaelen Strong came down with Bercovici's 46-yard pass to beat the No. 16 Trojans (3-2, 2-1 Pac-12) 38-34.
Graham said the team envisioned it happening in a meeting last night. But even the most active of imaginations couldn't have seen the Sun Devils (4-1, 2-1 Pac-12) falling behind 34-25 with three minutes and two seconds to play, failing to recover two onside kicks, only to win the game on a Hail Mary from the backup quarterback.
MORE: See all USC game coverage
Bercovici was a hard man to find in the post-game swarm of jubilation on the field of Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. After he'd thrown the pass and seen Strong catch it, he fell to the ground. Exhausted. Overwhelmed. For once, the man of many words had few. He'd just experienced the best moment of his football life, as Graham put it — the quarterback that grew up in Los Angeles quickly agreed.
ASU coach Todd Graham directs his defense in a game against USC in Los Angeles on Oct. 4. (Photo by Alexis Macklin)
As Graham has so frequently reminded everyone in the last two and a half weeks, Bercovici didn't have to stick around. He could be starting every game for another Division I team, rather than filling in for redshirt senior Taylor Kelly while he is injured. That was never a thought in Bercovici's mind, though. He may not have ever been able to imagine this moment, but he's never envisioned himself anywhere else.
"I used to dream about what would satisfy me more than anything in the world," he said. "And I was wearing a fork on my helmet."
The game was rife with errors, offensively, defensively and by the coaching staff. They led to multiple nine-point deficits for the Sun Devils throughout the contest, but the play in the final three minutes erased everyone's memory of those and placed only thoughts of joy or sorrow, depending which side one was on, in their heads.
That was especially true for the coaches and players, who weren't about to talk about 133 kick and punt return yards allowed, or numerous missed tackles, or the little pressure the defense put on USC redshirt junior quarterback Cody Kessler, or the lack of a running game.
And while those points may loom large in the future, Saturday night was the Mike Bercovici show. He followed up his debut 488-yard performance last week with a better encore than even the Beatles could provide. Bercovici threw for 510 yards and five touchdowns. And, most importantly, he didn't turn the ball over once, nor did the rest of the team.
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"To correct everything we did wrong last week," Graham said, "to have 100 percent ball security and correct those mistakes, that was big."
It helps as a quarterback to have a target such as a Strong. The junior college transfer, also from the LA area, had possibly his best game as a Sun Devil. In a career that has included 10 games of 100 or more yards, this was the first one of 200. It was also Strong's first multi-touchdown game — he caught three.
But most importantly, Strong came down with what has been deemed the "Jael-Mary."
"It's a game of inches, and that's the things we work for all offseason," Strong said. "The last play. ...
"I saw the ball in the air and the first thing I thought was I'm going to get this. At first, I thought I don't know if I can get to it, but I put my head down and kept running and got it. I don't even remember."
Since arriving on campus in 2012, Graham has been involved in a few games that will increase a heart rate — the Wisconsin, and UCLA games last year, the Missouri and UCLA games in 2012 — but none of them have compared to this. Graham said his heart stopped when Strong made the catch in the end zone. He called it the "most unbelievable" game he's coached.
And his team came out on top.
"From a team standpoint," Graham said, "that's the best win we've had since I've been here."
Reach the reporter at ewebeck@asu.edu or follow him on Twitter @EvanWebeck
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