Frankie Collins ignites Arizona State basketball to thrilling comeback win over Cal

BERKELEY, Calif. - Arizona State basketball coach Bobby Hurley stood in a hallway in the bowels of Haas Pavilion moments after the Sun Devils overcame a 16-point deficit to defeat the host Cal Bears. He left to head back to join his team in the locker room, giving way to his junior point guard Frankie Collins who took his turn in front of reporters.

"Frankie, you can fly the plane home too if you want," Hurley said as he walked away.

It was indeed Collins that led the ferocious comeback. He tallied a career-high 25 points with four rebounds and six steals as the Sun Devils (8-5, 2-0) wiped away a 16-point deficit winning on the road for the second time in as many games, 71-69 on Sunday.

It was not much different than the game ASU played on Friday at Stanford, which the Sun Devils won 76-73 after trailing by 12 in the second half. In that one, ASU didn't take its first lead until 30 seconds remained on a basket by you know who - Collins.

The sweep of the Northern California schools puts ASU at 2-0 in conference play, atop the Pac-12 along with Colorado, Utah and Oregon. It marked the first time ASU has started conference play 2-0 with a pair of road wins since the 1987-88 season.

Both wins played into quite a trend and one that has meant a lot of dramatic moments when the Sun Devils are on the floor. The road trip wins marked the 38th and 39th victories in games decided by two possessions or less. That leads the entire nation with Wisconsin's 37 the second most.

It is obviously different groups of players and Hurley couldn't really put his finger on the reason.

"I think we value fitness, conditioning and we practice hard,'' he said. "So I think that helps. We try to create an environment of competition in practice where you hope you can fight through adversity and then late in the game find a way to make a play. Get a stop on defense. Our defense was really good down the stretch again."

Collins went 10-of-17 from the field. He came into the contest among the national leaders in steals. Those were as pivotal as his points,. He had a driving layup with 3:11 left to give ASU its first lead of the contest at 64-62. Moments earlier he had a steal that led to a Jamiya Neal bucket to get the visitors within two at 60-58.

His driving layup gave ASU a 70-67 lead with seconds left and the Sun Devils hung on from there.

Hurley acknowledged that was Collins' best performance in his ASU tenure.

"It's the best game that I've seen him play, just top top to bottom. Even when we werenb't playing well. He was really our main source of offense. But steals, the shot making, attacking the basket. Just courageous performance."

Collins didn't disagree.

"That's definitely the best game I played since I have been here. I just want to do whatever I can do to help us win. and it clearly wasn't assists today," he laughed.

It was an unusual game in that regard as ASU had zero assists and that many offensive rebounds in the first half. The first assist didn't come until 9:28 remained in the game and it came from Jamiya Neal on a bucket by Alonzo Gaffney. At that point the Sun Devils had 11 turnovers. They ended up with three assists on 25 made field goals.

Both Hurley and Collins said that the team's win over Stanford provided a much-needed boost of confidence which was especially needed after poor performances against TCU and Northwestern heading into Christmas.

After the latter game, Hurley talked about his team lacking connections and players not trusting each other. So another loss, particularly against teams that were also struggling and been bottom feeders in the conference as of late, could have sent his team spiraling in the wrong direction.

Sunday's game marked the 18th straight conference loss for the Bears (4-9, 0-2), who lost a game earlier this season after being ahead by 26 points.

"We were in a dark place heading into Christmas after the Northwestern game but the guys came back with the right attitude, practiced hard, kind of a renewed commitment. It was a much cleaner performance on Friday, just across the board,'' Hurley said. "This one was kind of a gut check type of game where we didn't have anywhere close to our best but we stayed in the game. I was in a little disbelief we were only down 10 at the halftime."

The pair of wins also marked the 41st and 42nd victories in the Hurley tenure in which the Sun Devils rallied for a win after trailing at the half. They rank among the nation's top 15 teams in that category in games dating back to 2015-2016.

Collins said he is hoping the team doesn't keep let it getting to that.

"It just shows our willing to fight. We prefer to be winning throughout the whole game but getting the win, however we get it is fine. We tend to continue to stick together. That's the best thing about it. We stick together regardless of how much we're down."

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Frankie Collins ignites ASU basketball to comeback win over Cal