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Top Stories:
Davon Durant dismissed from ASU football: Davon Durant was hailed as the next great Devilbacker to excel under Todd Graham. However, his March 7 arrest for domestic violence left his head coach with a crisis of conscience, one he answered Wednesday when Sports Illustrated reported Graham's decision to separate the program from the embattled linebacker.
Durant's legal charges were dropped, making Graham's decision to let him go all the more surprising. But Graham has emphasized character and integrity since the day he arrived in Tempe, and while Durant's on-field abilities would've contributed to the Sun Devils in 2015, Graham's stand against domestic violence is a welcome one.
D.J. Foster: ASU's most important player. Okay, obviously Mike Bercovici is the player whose performance will have the greatest impact on the success of the 2015 campaign, but for the purposes of not stating the obvious, ESPN listed D.J. Foster as the most important member of this upcoming season's team.
Whereas Bercovici had to wait until this season to take the reins of the Arizona State offense, Foster has been a consistent spark for the Sun Devils since he arrived on campus in 2012. Moving from running back to wide receiver this year, Foster's task is now to help make up for the production of Jaelen Strong and Cameron Smith.
Update on 2015 recruits: A pair of players committed to play for the Sun Devils won't be joining the program in the fall, and another's status is still up in the air. Stanley Norman, a consensus four-star who is one of the team's top recruits from the 2015 class, has been rehabbing a knee injury suffered his senior year and has opted to greyshirt his first year. Norman won't join the program until January, but maintains his four years of eligibility and the option to redshirt.
Morie Evans, a three-star running back, won't be joining the team either, but his future as a Sun Devil is in more peril than Norman's. Evans failed to qualify academically and thus won't be coming to Tempe. ASU's still waiting on the academic situation of four-star running back Jason Lewis to be finalized, as the bruising back would compete for snaps his first year if cleared to play.
Shaq McKissic struggles in Summer League loss: The small forward who spent two years at Arizona State wasn't picked in the NBA draft last month, but he signed on to play with the Sacramento Kings summer league team, who played the Warriors on Wednesday. McKissic earned 15 minutes of playing time, but failed to impress in his time on the court, going 0-4 from the field and committing a pair of turnovers.