| Arizona State QB Taylor Kelly has 11 TD passes in his last three games following Thursday's five-touchdown performance against Colorado. (US Presswire) |
Most people would argue that USC quarterback Matt Barkley, Oregon State QB Sean Mannion and Arizona QB Matt Scott are the top three QBs in the Pac-12, but you might want to start adding Arizona State QB Taylor Kelly to that argument.
Thirteen days after torching Cal for 292 yards and three touchdowns, Kelly followed that up Thursday with a 308-yard, five-touchdown performance in the Sun Devils' 51-17 road win over Colorado. Kelly finished 20 of 28 and added 67 rushing yards to his 308 passing yards.
Although Kelly threw three first-half touchdown passes -- two to RB Marion Grice -- the pesky Buffaloes were able to keep things close thanks in large part to 10 points in the final 34 seconds of the first half. However, Arizona State blew things open in the second half, starting with Rashad Ross's 100-yard kickoff return for a TD to open the third quarter. Kelly followed Ross' big return with two more TD passes and the ASU defense did its part, holding Colorado (1-5, 1-2 Pac-12) scoreless in the second half.
Kelly's five touchdown passes marked the third consecutive game in which he has thrown multiple TD passes, while his 308 yards marked the third game in a row in which he has thrown for at least 290 yards. The Sun Devils won all three of those games.
Arizona State's win sets up a showdown next Thursday between the Pac-12 South-leading Sun Devils (5-1, 3-0) and the Pac-12 North-leading Oregon Ducks (6-0, 3-0).
Arizona State was 5-1 and ranked 18th in the country last season before the Oregon game, but a 41-27 loss to the Ducks sent ASU on a 1-6 slide to end the season, a slide that eventually cost former coach Dennis Erickson his job.
Grice is nice: Junior running back Marion Grice is slowly turning into junior wide receiver Marion Grice. Grice had only one carry in the game, but he did catch five passes for 101 yards and three touchdowns. Both the yardage and touchdown totals are career highs. The explosive Grice now has nine touchdowns on the season.
Tangled Webb: The struggles of Colorado transfer QB Jordan Webb continued Thursday. Webb completed less than 50 percent of his passes (20 of 41) and threw for only 180 yards. The Kansas transfer was running for his life most of the night; the ASU defense sacked Webb five times.
High-scoring Sun Devils: The 51 points scored against Colorado were the most Arizona State has scored against an FBS opponent since beating UCLA 55-34 in November 2010. Through six games, the Sun Devils are averaging 40.5 points per game.
(For more on the game, check out CBSSports.com's Eye on College Football blog here)
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