ARLINGTON, Texas — Coming into Saturday’s matchup, it was a known issue that Arizona State running back Cam Skattebo would pose a problem for an Iowa State defense that has struggled to stop the run all season.

The 1,398-yard, 17-touchdown scorer continued his dominance as expected, as Skattebo torched the Cyclones defense all game long en route to a 45-19 win over No. 16 Iowa State to give the No. 15 Sun Devils their first Big 12 title in their inaugural season.

Right out of the gate, after the Cyclones deferred the coin toss to the second half, the Arizona State offense, led by Skattebo, got an opportunity to get in front of Iowa State.

On the very first play, Skattebo found a way to rush for 28 yards to get the Sun Devils onto the Cyclones side of the field. While the drive only resulted in a field goal, this was only the beginning of what would become a bloodbath.

While Iowa State went down and scored on its first drive of the game after quarterback Rocco Becht found running back Carson Hansen for a three-yard touchdown, it was the final time that the Cyclones led in the game.

Arizona State quarterback Sam Leavitt rushed for his only score of the game on the next drive, on a three-yard keeper, after completing a 63-yard pass to wide receiver Melquan Stovall that got the Sun Devils in range to score the touchdown.

After the Cyclones went on to score a field goal to start the second quarter, it ended up being the quarter that Skattebo and Arizona State would end up pulling away in, as they put up two touchdowns, both scored by the star running back.

Skattebo achieved both of those scores by rushing for 105 yards in the second quarter alone, with his longest run being 53 yards to open up the Sun Devils’ final drive of the first half, in which he was the only player to get the ball on that final drive with his two-yard rush capping it off.

While Skattebo’s role decreased over the next two quarters on the ground, he still was able to make an impact through the air as Leavitt would find Skattebo for a 33-yard touchdown that would be the final points that Arizona State would put up in the game.

Skattebo’s final stat line of the game resulted in 170 yards on 16 attempts for two touchdowns, along with 38 yards on two receptions, one being the 33-yard score.

“[Skattebo] is a really good football player,” Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell said. “Anytime you witness a great football player like that, you just have to have a great appreciation for it. He’s an A player and played an A game so hat’s off to him for sure.” 

Even while knowing the capabilities of Skattebo while having faced tough running backs in the past, the Cyclone defense was not prepared to face a Heisman-caliber back Saturday.

“The second half of the season we’ve really started to shore some of those things up,” Campbell said on cleaning up the missed tackles and giving up big games on the ground. “Unfortunately today that didn’t show up.”

“We’ve been practicing tackling all week, but we failed,” Iowa State defensive lineman J.R. Singleton said. “The offense needed us and we just didn’t accomplish what we needed to do.”

In the second half, Leavitt’s playmaking abilities continued to show, as even without his 1,000-yard receiver in Jordyn Tyson, the Sun Devil offense found success on multiple occasions against an Iowa State defense that had been atop the conference in both scoring and passing.

All three of Leavitt’s passing touchdowns came in the third quarter, as he found wide receiver Xavier Guillory for the first two from eight and 21 yards out respectively, along with the Skattebo 33-yarder to finish off his day.

“We were just not clicking on all cylinders,” Iowa State defensive back Myles Purchase said.

A once stout Iowa State defense would go on to look like cheese going through a grater as things began to unravel during the course of a Big 12 Championship game, where the Cyclones had looked to claim their first conference title after falling short in 2020.

“We were just not fundamentally where we needed to be when we needed to be,” Campbell said. “It’s my responsibility to make sure where we need and when we need to be there and we weren’t.”