Did Arizona State Just Get Arizona's Sumlin Fired With 70-7 Beatdown In Territorial Cup?

December 11, 2020 by Staff

Both teams were winless, but Arizona's 7 turnovers led to a 70-7 loss to Arizona State on Friday night in the Territorial Cup.

The score was 42-7 at halftime, and 63-7 after 3 quarters.

Arizona had only 137 fewer yards (487-350) and 1 more first down (18-17), but Kevin Sumlin's team never had a chance as 3 INT's and 4 fumbles took the 'Cats out of the game. Arizona fell to 0-5 while Herm Edwards' Sun Devils improved to 1-2.

Arizona was a 9.5-point underdog and that was covered 56 seconds into the game.The computer's projected upset never had a chance.

After D.J. Taylor returned the opening kickoff 106 yards for a touchdown, Gary Brightwell fumbled on Arizona's second play from scrimmage and DeaMonte Trayanum's 4-yard run made it 14-0 with 14:04 to go in the first quarter.

Sumlin's record slouched to 9-20 in 3 seasons and 0-3 against the school's rival . Sumlin never had a losing campaign at Texas A&M, but only topped the .500 mark in SEC games one time. He had only 1 losing year in 4 seasons at Houston and the 2011 was 12-0 before losing to Southern Miss in the Conference USA Championship game. A week later, he resigned to take the A&M job, but was fired by the Aggies after a 7-5 season in year 6.

It's widely expected Sumlin will be fired on Sunday after the Wildcats' losing streak stretched to 12 games.

Also on Friday:

Two scores by UTEP in the final 6:32 flipped the result for bettors in the Miners' game with North Texas. The Mean Green had the 9 points easily covered and the computer's 14.37-point projected margin basically nailed until the 45-28 lead turned into a 45-43 final.

With widespread Covid-19 issues in El Paso, both teams agreed to play the game in Denton instead.