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UTSA GAMEDAY: Roadrunners open season in Arizona desert against ASU

Arizona State rallied for 32-28 win over UTSA in teams' first meeting two years ago.
UTSA quarterback Dalton Sturm, threw for 229 yards and three touchdowns and ran for 82 yards and another score in the Roadrunners' 32-28 loss to Arizona State in 2016. Photo by Antonio Morano (Antonio Morano bit.ly/XR79FT) / Special to KENS5.com

UTSA vs. Arizona State (season opener for both teams)

When, where: Saturday, 9:30 p.m., Sun Devil Stadium, Tempe, Ariz.

Series history: Arizona State leads 1-0

Last meeting: Arizona State 32, UTSA 28, Sept. 3, 2016, Alamodome

UTSA record in season openers: 6-1

Notable: The game will mark the debut of former NFL player and coach Herm Edwards as Arizona State head coach . . . Junior Cordale Grundy, a junior-college transfer who played at Northeastern Oklahoma A&M the past two years, will start at quarterback for UTSA. Graduate transfer D.J. Gillins also could get some snaps in the opener . . . The Roadrunners are 38-44 in the 82 games they have played since kicking off their inaugural season in 2011.

There will be no shortage of storylines when UTSA opens its eighth football season against Arizona State on the road Saturday night.

For the Roadrunners, the paramount question that has hovered over their program throughout the spring and summer has been about the quarterback position. Steady Dalton Sturm set records and started 31 consecutive games before he completed his career last year.

For ASU, much of the buzz in the preseason has centered on Herm Edwards’ debut as head coach. Edwards, a former NFL player and coach, had been an ESPN studio analyst for nine years since getting fired as the Kansas City Chiefs’ head coach in January 2009.

Edwards hadn’t coached on the college level since 1989, when he was an assistant at San Jose State, before getting hired last December to succeed Todd Graham at ASU.

Saturday night’s game is a rematch of the teams’ first meeting in 2016, when the Sun Devils rallied for a 32-28 victory at the Alamodome. Down 28-12 in the third quarter, ASU pulled out the win on a 2-yard touchdown run by Kalen Ballage with 3:15 left.

Clemens graduate Frank Harris appeared to be on track to become UTSA’s new starting quarterback, but a knee injury during spring training took him out of the mix and probably sidelined him for the entire season.

Defensive ends Ben Kane (43) and Eric Banks (90) puts the clamps on ASU running back Demario Richard in UTSA's 32-28 loss to the Sun Devils on Sept. 3 at the Alamodome. Photo by Antonio Morano (Antonio Morano bit.ly/XR79FT) / Special to KENS5.com

Coach Frank Wilson announced Monday that junior Cordale Grundy, who transferred from Northeastern Oklahoma A&M in January, would start against ASU.

“We anticipate that at some point in the game to get D.J. Gillins involved as well,” said Wilson, who is starting his third season at UTSA.. “But Cordale will be the starter.”

Gillins, a former four-star recruit, is a graduate transfer who was on the SMU roster last year.

Asked what the key factor was in his decision to name Grundy the starter, Wilson said: His composure, his ability to not be affected by the moments. Just the consistency that we are looking for from the position. We saw some of the same things in D.J. as well.”

Wilson said the fact that Grundy has been in the program since January gave him a slight advantage over Gillins, who went to school at SMU the entire spring semester.

“He’s probably a week or two away from being at his peak or his very best, but it could have gone either way,” Wilson said of Gillins. “Two guys that performed very well. They took care of the ball and made good decisions.

“They were accurate and can both run the ball if need be. You feel very confident that you have two guys that are capable of going in and playing.”

UTSA wide receiver JaBryce Taylor stretches out to catch a 10-yard touchdown pass from Dalton Sturm that gave the Roadrunners a 7-3 lead over ASU in 2016. Photo by Antonio Morano (Antonio Morano bit.ly/XR79FT) / Special to KENS5.com

Senior running back Jalen Rhodes, who led the Roadrunners’ in rushing last year with 659 yards, is among four offensive starters returning from a team that finished 6-5 overall and 3-5 in Conference USA. They have been picked to finish fifth in the West Division for the second year in a row.

Led by end Marcus Davenport, the defense was a bright spot for UTSA last year, leading C-USA in seven different statistical categories and ranking in the top 10 nationally in five, including eighth in scoring defense (17.0).

While the Roadrunners don’t have a player of Davenport’s caliber on their defense this season, they landed six players on the preseason all-conference team: lineman Kevin Strong Jr., ends Eric Banks and Baylen Baker, linebacker Josiah Tauaefa and safeties Carl Austin and C.J. Levine.

UTSA faces the task Saturday night of trying to keep up with wide receiver N’Keal Harry, a preseason consensus All-America pick who had 82 receptions for 1,142 yards and eight touchdowns last year.

ASU finished 7-6 overall and 6-3 in the Pac-12 last year.

Saturday night’s game will be first of three in a row against a Power 5 opponent. The Roadrunners host Baylor in their home opener next Saturday at the Alamodome. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m.

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