Where did the Sun Devils’ basketball season go wrong?

At least the season started out strong. On December 3, ASU basketball would roar out to an 8-1 record following a drubbing of San Diego, 90-53. Things were heading in the proper direction. In the three months since then, the Sun Devils won just five games. After such a promising start, what went wrong for the Sun Devils and ASU basketball?

conference play

“I’m a fighter, so I’m prepared for it and I think our team will be as well. I think what we’ve been able to put together in terms of rebuilding our roster has me as hopeful as I’ve been probably since I’ve been here about the possibilities with this team,” Sun Devils head coach Bobby Hurley told PHNX back in June. “You’d better roll up your sleeves and be ready to battle in this conference.”

Unfortunately, the Sun Devils were not ready to battle. Despite a top recruiting class featuring lauded transfers, a five-star prospect in Jayden Quaintance and a pair of four-star prospects, Joson Sanon and Amier Ali, ASU couldn’t get it done against their Big 12 foes.

Alston Mason, who previously played in the Big 12 during his freshman year at Oklahoma before transferring to Missouri State and then ASU, admitted although he was ready for the challenge of playing in a tougher conference, the injuries and lack of depth made it hard for the team to overcome other conference teams.

“With our team I had the highest expectations with the caliber of players we had and the people and the characters that each of my teammates had,” Mason said. “But with the injuries and everything kinda made a lot of things a lot more difficult and gave us a challenge that was kind of hard for us to overcome.”

Hurley mentioned after the Sun Devils’ Big 12 tournament loss to Kansas State that the team struggled with their lack of depth when having to go from playing BYU to Colorado to Kansas to Baylor, and forward Basheer Jihad concurred.

“Like Coach said, having those heavy hitters almost every game, coming back home, having to play Baylor stuff like that, it’s a big challenge, you know, and it’s tough for sure,” Jihad said.

lack of discipline

Heading into a Feb. 15 game against TCU, it was an opportunity to potentially turn the season around. The team was riding a four game losing streak, including losses to arch-rival Arizona and close losses to Kansas State and Texas Tech. The matchup with TCU represented a chance to lift the team up. Instead, the team folded under the pressure.

It became the third of the last five games someone got ejected, in this case it was guard Adam Miller. Just before then in a one-point loss to Kansas State, Miller had been ejected as well. For his incident with Kansas State, Miller was suspended by the team. And of course, BJ Freeman was ejected from the rivalry game with Arizona after getting into a head-butting incident with Caleb Love. Freeman would also be suspended by the team for the incident, and subsequently would be kicked off the team for conduct detrimental to the team.

Miller and Freeman were seniors and supposed to be leaders on a team with tournament aspirations, but instead, couldn’t rely on them to let cooler heads prevail. Could it be a coaching issue too? If there’s anything Bobby Hurley is known for, it’s being a hot head. If the leaders can’t look to their own leader to be a measure of composure, should we be surprised at all that Miller and Freeman were unable to keep their heads on straight? There has been some speculation that Hurley could be on the hot seat, though all reports indicate he’ll return for yet another season at the helm.

Playmaking

Outside of point guard Alston Mason, the Sun Devils can say nobody on the team averaged even two assists per game. That’s what an expert might describe as “not good.” As a team, they averaged only 13.2 a game, a mark representing only 188th in the country, lower than less prestigious programs such as Yale, Lipscomb and Maine.

Additionally, the Sun Devils were unable to keep control of the ball. While their total per game ranked as one of the best in the Big 12, their assist-to-turnover ratio ranked as one of the worst with a 1.04 ratio in conference play. The Sun Devils were able to bring in freshman Trevor Best part way through the year, but it wasn’t of much help. Best only saw 11 minutes per game in 10 appearances, but was only able to muster up 0.5 assists during his time on the court.

Injuries

Austin Nunez returned to Tempe after taking his talents to Ole Miss for his sophomore year. Thwarted by injury throughout his limited season (just four games), it was revealed by CBS college basketball insider John Rothstein that Nunez would miss the remainder of the season after undergoing foot surgery.

Joson Sanon missed time with an ankle sprain around the new year before making his return for good, but it’s been rough sledding for the Vermont native since coming back. The sixth man was shooting about 45% from deep before the injury, prompting Bobby Hurley to call him one of the best shooters he’d ever had the privilege of coaching at ASU. Since the calendar flipped to 2025 though, Sanon has been just a 27% shooter from three, well below what you would want to see from someone hailed as a premier offensive piece and star of a highly heralded recruiting class.

Jayden Quaintance has been healthy most of the year, but when he’s missed time it hasn’t been pretty. The starring freshman rolled an ankle against Oklahoma State and missed the next three games before returning against Kansas State. However, in that same game, Quaintance suffered a knee injury, left the arena on crutches and hasn’t returned since. Quaintance would miss the Sun Devils’ only Big 12 tournament game, likely ending his season right there.

When players went down, ASU lacked the depth to support the team in those absences. Many times the Sun Devils could only go six or seven players deep, and in the case of when Quaintance was out, had to play without a true backup center. Compare this to when the team was running eight and nine-man lineups to start the year before injuries started to affect the team.

“We brought in high profile freshmen and unfortunately for the freshmen, they both had different stretches of the season, had significant injury that they had to go through,” Hurley said. “Both of those guys were a big part of what we’re doing. I mean like, we just have to do a better job of just having more options in case something happens with a key player.”

Looking ahead

The 2024-25 Sun Devils basketball season will be defined by inefficiency and let downs. Whether it was failing to live up to the hype of their recruiting class, the toughness of joining a new conference, a lack of discipline from their leaders, an absence of playmaking or just being injured, ASU basketball couldn’t live up to the hype. For next year, the Sun Devils need to address these issues, especially their lack of depth. In what could be Hurley’s final season coaching the team, they’ll need to strengthen up on the problems which plagued them this last season.

In order to make next season a success, a few things will have to go their way.

• Can the Sun Devils get Koa Peat to come their way? And if he does, how deep will the team be behind him? ASU did not have the bodies to deal with their star players going down with injury.
• Will Jayden Quaintance be ready for next season? He went down late in the season with a knee injury and no diagnosis has been made public. If the Sun Devils are without Quaintance, they’ll need to quickly find someone to fill in his role.
• How will they navigate the transfer portal this year? With the portal opening on March 24 and four seniors leaving, ASU will need to be active on the recruiting trail
• Additionally, James Harden made a “high six-figure donation” to ASU athletics. How does this influx of money affect potential NIL opportunities, especially if another large donor gets involved?
• Graham Rossini teased the fact that Desert Financial Arena could be renovated soon. How would a new-look DFA potentially enhance recruiting?

If the Sun Devils can address these topics properly, it could make for a comeback season after this most recent dreadful year.