After a rough start to the season for the ASU football team, the Sun Devils return home to Sun Devil Stadium for the first time in 2015 looking to get off the schneid.
ASU's annual FCS opponent this season is the Cal Poly Mustangs, fresh off a one-point win over Montana, a perennial championship contender in the division. While many outside wouldn't consider the Mustangs anything to be trifled with, their offensive schemes can make coaches crazy.
The Mustangs are led by senior quarterback Chris Brown, who rushed for 1,256 yards and 17 touchdowns as a junior and is off to an equally good start in 2015. In Cal Poly's first game of the season, Brown carried the ball 24 times for 130 yards and a touchdown.
Cal Poly is one of the few teams playing high-level college football that still runs the triple-option, making game planning difficult, according to coach Todd Graham.
"This is a total different deal, you don't play this very often," Graham said. "The key is being disciplined. You've got to be assignment-oriented. You've got to take the dive, take the quarterback, take the pitch. It's just so very different from anything else you're going to play."
The basis of the triple-option is that the offense has three different players who can carry the ball on every play, creating complications for unprepared or over-aggressive defenses. The offensive gameplan is almost exclusively running the ball, meaning they can control the tempo of the game and limit possession for more offensive-inclined teams.
That ball-control is one of the bigger difficulties, according to Graham.
"You have to score, you have to play from ahead," Graham said. "You can't let them hang around because they will eat up the clock and you're going to get loss opportunities, so you have to maximize you're offense."
Reach the reporter at mtonis@asu.edu or follow @Tonis_The_Tiger on Twitter.
Like State Press Sports on Facebook and follow @statepresssport on Twitter.
