First year at ASU a learning experience for Edwards
Arizona State’s new coach Herm Edwards goes from coaching against Oregon State’s first-year coach Jonathan Smith last week to matching wits with some of the longer tenured coaches in the Pac-12 over the next few weeks.
Next up for ASU (3-2 overall, 1-1 Pac-12) is Colorado’s sixth-year coach Mike MacIntyre on Saturday in Boulder, Colo. After that, Edwards will coach against Stanford’s eighth-year coach David Shaw, USC’s fourth-year coach Clay Helton and Utah’s 14-year coach Kyle Whittingham.
He then coaches against UCLA’s new coach Chip Kelly, but Kelly coached at Oregon for four seasons before trying to coach in the NFL.
Edwards in his first coaching position in 10 years, but that was in the NFL. He is in his first season as a college head coach after working as an ESPN broadcaster for nine years.
“I’m just learning this. It’s my first run through the conference,” Edwards said Monday during his weekly press conference. “But I’m a pretty quick study. I’ll do my homework when the season is over and know more about the conference and the players and the coaches and as far as recruiting.
“I’m learning something every time I play a game. It’s how you process information. When you know other people’s personnel and have played against them, that’s a big factor. You kind of know who they are. It’s like in the NFL. We’re playing Buffalo, here’s what they do, how are we going to attack them?”
On the flipside, opposing Pac-12 coaches must learn about ASU under Edwards after becoming accustomed to the Sun Devils’ tendencies under former coach Todd Graham.
Edwards mentioned that opposing coaches must be asking, “What are they?”
“Are they this run team now, what are they on defense?” Edwards added. “When you’re the new coach, you’re trying to learn them, but they’re also trying to learn you. When the game starts, how does he coach the game?”
It’s becoming obvious that ASU is a run-first offense under Edwards as evidenced by Eno Benjamin’s school-record 312 yards against Oregon State.
ASU had 396 yards rushing against the Beavers. In the previous game at Washington, the Sun Devils had 164 yards rushing and only 104 passing.
“I just like running, it’s fun to watch,” Edwards said. “Some people don’t like it because it’s boring. They want to see the ball fly in the air. It doesn’t take a whole lot to turn around and give it to the guy.
“It’s really hard to mess that one up. And the ball’s not heavy so the guy can carry it, and if we can block them then the guy is going to run and everything else opens up.”