Kenny Dillingham, ASU working to close the gap in CFB arms race

It hasn’t been as easy as rubbing a magic lamp and asking a genie to grant a wish immediately, but Arizona State head coach Kenny Dillingham is slowly seeing his efforts to improve the financial standing of his program come to fruition.

Though the methods have seemed unusual to some at times, including Dillingham’s call-to-action for someone in the Valley to make a significant eight-figure donation to the program after signing a new contract last December, Dillingham’s efforts have worked.

“I stood on the pedestal and said crazy things, and people liked it, some people not, well, we found that amount of money…,” Dillingham said.

In addition to that sizeable gift that will go towards the construction of the Sun Devils’ new practice facility, a recent $10 million endowment of Dillingham’s head coaching position from philanthropists Brian and Kelly Swette, the largest endowed position in Sun Devil athletics, was another stark and positive sign that the winds of change are apparent in Tempe.

All Dillingham did was ask.

“If I just stayed quiet and said everything is roses and candy canes all the time, there’s no such thing as roses and candy canes in college football, it’s an arms race to continue to compete and get better,” Dillingham remarked. “So, if we ever say we’ve made it, we’re there, we’ve got every support we need, I’m actually hurting our football program.”

These financial developments have played a major role in some of the feats ASU is trying to accomplish. When it comes to the construction of a new indoor practice facility, Arizona State’s head coach hopes it will benefit not only his team but the community at large.

“My goal is not just to put up an indoor facility, but to put up an indoor facility that’s the best, if not one of the best, facilities in the country,” Dillingham commented. “We’re in Phoenix, Arizona, it’s hot, and it’s one of the largest cities… There’s more to it than just building us an indoor. This is actually a community asset if we do it right and get to a high enough level.”

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Building a relationship with the community is something Dillingham stressed is a mere duty of working for a state university, and he believes securing donations and support to fund program amenities will become easier as the Sun Devils’ national brand grows.

However, the challenge of winning the bidding war to build a college football roster in today’s NIL and transfer portal era still looms.

Dillingham hopes the Project College Sports Act, a bipartisan federal bill currently being discussed on Capitol Hill, designed to stabilize collegiate athletics, will help address some of the big issues in college sports.

“I’ve looked at the bill, and there are some good things in it, you know, there are some bad things in it,” Dillingham stated. “I’m really for anything that is driven for players and athletes, and when I say that, I mean all players and athletes.”

But even with increased financial support, Dillingham said ASU is still working to level up with other schools across the country.

“I like to say, when I got here, we were in a marathon, but it was like we started four hours after everybody else started this marathon,” Dillingham explained. “So, even though we’re catching up, we’re getting better, and we’re improving in a lot of areas, we’re so far behind, and they’re still running. They just didn’t stop and say, ‘Let Arizona State catch up,’ they’re still trying to run the race.

“We’re trying to catch up and win the race at the same time, so we’re catching up, but we’re not even in the same ballpark of winning this race right now, and that’s why we got to continue to push and continue to get the Phoenix area involved through the collective, through the university, in any way, shape they can to help us compete. That’s what’s needed to happen if we want to compete at the highest level.”

While navigating the treacherous waters of NIL, Dillingham hopes events like ASU’s annual youth camp, held inside the Verde Dickey Dome on Wednesday morning, serve as a reminder to his players of how fortunate they are to be in the position they’re in.

“(ASU’s players) lay in their beds when they were these kids’ age and said, ‘Man, how cool would that be if I could play college football?’” Dillingham reflected. “They didn’t talk about money. They didn’t talk about any of that. Now they get to make money and play college football. So I think these moments are moments for them to reflect on, man, look how lucky I am.”

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Missing the majority of the 2025 season due to injury, ASU junior running back Kyson Brown understands why Dillingham places importance on that reflection.

“It puts it into perspective the pure love for the game,” Brown said. “These kids, they’re probably not even worried about anything else, but just the love for the game. So it ultimately just allows me to come out here and just show my love for the game.”

Despite the Sun Devils forecasted win total betting line this year hovering around 6.5 victories, Dillingham’s three-year tenure at ASU has been admired by many, including former ASU quarterback and fellow Arizona State alumnus Rudy Carpenter.

Carpenter admitted he wasn’t initially in favor of ASU hiring Dillingham, who in 2023 became the youngest FBS head coach at a Power Four school at age 32, because he didn’t believe he was ready to assume the role. 

“I was wrong, and I’ve told Kenny this a million times,” Carpenter admitted. “In my viewpoint, he’s exceeded every expectation. I think he’s done a great job, and I just hope that we can find a way to keep him here as long as possible.

“You can activate the valley, you can raise money, you can have all these cool little words, but at the end of the day, you have to win games, and Kenny’s been able to do that.”

Notably, Dillingham’s been able to win games at ASU without changing his formula, even given transfer portal-induced roster building every couple of years and NIL challenges, obstacles that may now be reduced due to the increased financial support for the program.

“For us, we just try to be good people, make good decisions, and have more fun working harder than anyone in the country,” Dillingham said.