Danny Gonzales has confidence the ASU defense will be successful

Arizona State defensive coordinator Danny Gonzales made waves earlier this week proclaiming that he would quit if the Sun Devils defense wasn’t good within the next two years.

After reaping the benefits of extra time with his family during ASU’s bye week, a decompressed Gonzales joined 98.7 Arizona’s Sports Station’s Bickley and Marotta. 

“I’m not worried about what people think about me, all I know is that we’re going to be successful,” Gonzales said.

“I’ve got all the confidence in the world that we’re going to be good on defense around here. You can see glimpses of it and as we continue to get better at what we are doing, we will continue to get better week to week.”

Ahead of the bye week, Gonzales has the ASU defense tied for the lead in the Pac-12 in sacks with 18, and tied for second in the conference with four recovered fumbles.

“We’ve made progress but we have a long way to go,” Gonzales said.

The improvement is a tangible difference from when they finished fourth in sacks in 2017, and ninth in recovered fumbles.

“The biggest area I’m happy with is our effort on the field. The guys are playing extremely hard. We’re still learning how to play physical to the expectations we have,” Gonzales said.

And don’t take his threats to quit as a notion he already has a foot out the door. Gonzales said that running around Tempe Town Lake has become part of his regular routine and that keeping his family in Arizona would be ideal.

“If we build this thing up the way that I envision, I’ll be here for the next 20 years and call it a day and we’ll celebrate a whole lot of good times here at Arizona State football,” Gonzales said.

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