Jake Fette has ‘earned’ starting spot, Dillingham says his potential is ‘as high as anybody’

TEMPE — Arizona State will continue to roll with freshman Jake Fette as its starting quarterback while Mikey Keene continues to work back from a knee injury, head coach Kenny Dillingham said Monday.

“Right now, you got to say it’s Jake Fette. And I think he’s earned it. Now, Mikey’s working his way back, you know, from that perspective,” Dillingham said. “But I think Jake played really, really well in the second half, especially for a freshman on the road.

“To really take command, make the checks he made and the way he played in the second half was of a veteran, in my opinion, and so that gave me a lot of hope. Like I’ve said multiple times, communicating what he saw when he comes off the field, that continued in the football game.”

ASU’s 27-20 loss to BYU was Fette’s first college start. He settled in for the second half after looking sped up early, in part due to the six first-half sacks by the BYU defense.

The Sun Devils trailed 17-3 at halftime before he and the rest of the offense made it more of a contest in the second half. The closest ASU got was down by three at midfield with eight minutes left before deciding to punt on fourth-and-4.

Fette finished with 166 yards and two touchdowns on 22 of 42 passing without an interception. His lone turnover came when he fumbled the ball as he was sacked on his first dropback.

Keene injured his right knee during his first ASU start on Oct. 24 against Kansas State, and he was initially replaced by Cutter Boley. Fette came in for his first FBS action when ASU could not move the ball with Boley and trailed 17-14, and it helped spark the comeback for a 28-17 win.

Fette and Keene had shared first-team reps in the week of practice before the BYU game.

The freshman is expected to make his first home start Saturday against Colorado at 5:30 p.m. MST.

What did Kenny Dillingham say about Jake Fette’s first ASU start?

On how the ball was spread around with the keys in Fette’s hands:

Dillingham: “Jake did a great job spreading the ball around. … They were just sprinting that free safety over to Reed (Harris) a lot of the times, which opened up opportunities for other guys to make plays. I think Jake did a good job moving the ball around from that perspective. Especially in the second half, we tried to clean up the pictures and make it just a little bit cleaner, and I think he did that. I think he was very productive doing that.

“First half, there was a lull with too many bad down-and-distances there in the second quarter which knocks you completely out of all rhythm offensively. Then we had the two-minute drives, which is a whole different game. So now you’re asking a freshman to go out there and operate in a two-minute scenario on the road at BYU, which is not what you would have hoped. You’d hope you’d be in more positive advantage situations for him, so we really put him in a lull there for four straight drives that kind of got him out of a rhythm and then we got back in half and I thought he distributed it nicely.”

What is it about your conversations with Fette that shows you he’s on the right track?

Dillingham: “It’s just what he says he saw. So, why did you throw this or why did you throw the throw to Reed out of bounds, like what happened? Then he’ll go, ‘I saw the corner’s eyes and he was bailing so I tried to back-shoulder (Reed) and I missed him.’ All right. Solid answer. That makes sense why it looks like you were trying to throw him a jump ball down the field and you missed. No, you didn’t, you missed a back-shoulder throw, which you didn’t miss by as much. We just weren’t on the same page.

“So that makes me feel better. … Like, the things he was saying was accurate. So, I think any time you have a young buck who can say accurate things, really it just shows you that he sees the game. Some people struggle to see the game out there live. It’s one thing to watch on an iPad, it’s another thing to see what’s happening. … For him to be right a large majority of the time as a freshman gives me a lot of hope for his future.”

On how Fette’s confidence shows up despite being a freshman:

Dillingham: “He’s a very confident guy. He walks around confident. Even just how he managed the football game was confident. There was one time to start a drive when it was a 25-second clock early, lower on the shot clock that I had to burn a timeout. Other than that, procedurally, he was clean. He motioned, he made checks, he was aware of the clock, all those things give people confidence, which I thought he had in the football game.

“The way he carries himself in practice, his arm talent, all that stuff. People know he’s talented, so you combine that with his composure, and then he’s an extreme ownership guy. I try to tell him, ‘Hey, it’s OK. You saw it. Let’s get it next time.’ But he’s like, ‘No! I got to get that right.’ That’s his response and I’m like, ‘Oh, I agree but man you’re hard on yourself and that’s a good thing.’ The guys I’ve coached that have been the best have always been extremely hard on themselves to almost try to be perfect and I think he has that in him.”

On how his potential stacks up with others Dillingham has coached (Jordan Travis, Bo Nix, Sam Leavitt, etc.):

Dillingham: “As high as anybody.”

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