UCLA football snuffs out Sun Devils with best rushing performance in 12 years

This post was updated Nov. 8 at 12:42 p.m.

TEMPE — In an instant, Kazmeir Allen was gone.

Midway through the third quarter, the redshirt junior wide receiver took a handoff from his own 25-yard line, put his head down and turned it into high gear.

Once he crossed midfield, it wasn’t a matter of if Allen was going to score but how fast. He ran past the entire Arizona State defense in a few seconds, and in the blink of an eye, crossed the goal line into an end zone that fittingly read, “Sun Devils.”

The “Kazmanian Devil,” as Allen is often called, ran the final pitchfork into his opponent’s heart. 

Allen and No. 12 UCLA football (8-1, 5-1 Pac-12) ran past Arizona State (3-6, 2-4) on Saturday night in Tempe, beating the Sun Devils 50-36 in the team’s best rushing performance of the season. The blue and gold notched a season-high 402 yards on the ground – the team’s most in 12 years – with Allen being one of three Bruins to set a career high on the ground.

One player who did not notch a career high was senior running back Zach Charbonnet, who missed the contest for undisclosed reasons. After the game, coach Chip Kelly said his running back tried to go pregame but was ruled unavailable after warmups.

Allen – a converted wide receiver who entered the program as a running back – said he didn’t know Charbonnet would be out until shortly before the game began and had only a “few reps” at running back this past week at practice.

“I’ve played running back before, so it wasn’t like, ‘I’m kind of nervous,’” Allen said. “It was pretty normal for me.”

With or without Charbonnet, though, it was a rushing clinic from the get-go.

Allen totaled 137 rushing yards, redshirt senior quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson ran for 120 yards and redshirt junior running back Keegan Jones for 98 yards – all career highs. 

“We prepared really well,” Thompson-Robinson said. “We knew what we were going to get, and we got what we expected, … and it made for big plays.” 

After Thompson-Robinson threw an interception on the first play from scrimmage, the trio of Bruin rushers combined for 53 yards on the next possession to give UCLA its first score of the game – a 14-yard rush from the signal-caller that featured a hurdle into the end zone.

As he’s shown the last two years, one hurdle for Thompson-Robinson wasn’t enough. Two drives later, he leaped over another Sun Devil defender on a 33-yard run that put the Bruins in the red zone. Jones found paydirt the next play – his second score of the half – as UCLA extended its lead to double digits.

Thompson-Robinson credited his wide receivers for giving him the necessary room to scramble around – and over – the Arizona State defense.

“If you have a route and it’s man coverage, just run them down the field, and they will stare at you in the face the whole time until you get down there,” Thompson-Robinson said he told his receivers. “By the time they realized, it was over.”  

With the Bruins holding an 18-point advantage out of the break, it was more of the same to start the second half. 

Allen and Jones combined for 41 more rushing yards on the team’s opening possession of the half to set up Thompson-Robinson for another score. The fifth-year quarterback scrambled to his right and snuck in front of the pylon to give his team its largest lead of the night at 25 points. 

“He (Thompson-Robinson) kind of had to put it on his shoulders a little bit with not having Zach available,” Kelly said. “We needed his legs at certain points, and he made some critical plays for us.”

Though the Sun Devils responded to Thompson-Robinson’s final scoring scamper with a touchdown of their own, it was immediately matched by Allen’s 75-yard sprint. 

“With his speed, if he gets out in the open field, … it’s lights out,” Thompson-Robinson said.

Allen’s score was the Bruins’ sixth touchdown of the game, with the Bruins’ 42 points holding firm nearly through the final whistle.

Arizona State got within six, but a final UCLA drive composed of all rushing plays iced the game after a one-yard touchdown run from redshirt junior wide receiver Colson Yankoff.

The Bruins’ fourth quarter put them past the 400-yard rushing threshold for the first time since 2010, as the Bruins ran for a season-high 9.5 yards per carry. 

Kelly credited his offensive line, quarterback and backup running backs for giving UCLA the win. 

“It took all of those guys – it took every single guy – to finish off that football game,” Kelly said.