ASU football moves DE to offense to boost struggling unit

Arizona State football coach Kenny Dillingham was a little more demonstrative and vocal than usual when he met with his team after practice on Aug. 18. And that's saying a lot.

Dillingham was upset with the quality of play on offense. Since the team's execution in the red zone during Saturday's scrimmage at Camp Tontozona was poor, it might be a cause for concern.

Dillingham didn't hold back.

"Today was a bad day for the offense," he said. "Worst day by far. We didn't look like an offense today. Couldn't move the ball. When we did move the ball, we had penalties. So they gotta wake up. I told the defense, great job. Defense played great. We're flying around and playing hard. Offense, not good enough today. At all.

"It wasn't just because the defense played well. It's one thing when you don't do well because they make great one-on-one plays. That's football, right? Like in the scrimmage, there were some great one-on-one plays made on defense in the red zone. I'm fired up about that. Those effort plays are still showing up on defense, but now there are critical interim errors on offense. Those are the things you can't have. You can get beat one-on-one, but you can't have critical errors, and way too many critical errors today."

Tight end struggles

During team segments, Dillingham rotated through defensive players at tight end. He said he intends to move 6-foot- 4, 260-pound defensive end Clayton Smith to tight end for the next practice.

"We have to create some competition, challenge some people," Dillingham said. "It's about competition, so Clayton is going into the tight end room for one purpose: to create competition."

ASU is still without its top tight end, Khamari Anderson, who is working his way back from a broken leg sustained in spring drills, but Dillingham wasn't worried because of the depth at the position.

"I felt good until today," he said.

This won't be the first experiment with Smith on offense. In the spring, Smith played wide receiver, and he is still listed on the team's roster as an "athlete" rather than having a specific position.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: ASU football moves DE to offense to boost struggling unit