Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty has turned the ground game into

  • Paolo Uggetti, ESPNOct 25, 2024, 07:00 AM ET

BOISE, Idaho — On a gloomy October morning, Boise State’s Albertsons Stadium was nearly empty but full of action. There were a few scattered donors among the grandstands and a handful of NFL scouts dotting the sidelines of the blue turf during this bye-week practice.

All of them want to catch a glimpse of Ashton Jeanty.

It doesn’t take long to see that inside this universe, Jeanty has become the sun. The 2023 Mountain West Offensive Player of the Year is no sudden revelation, but the season that the 20-year-old junior running back has put together is turning him into a local phenomenon and a nationwide sensation.

“I did have high hopes for myself,” Jeanty told ESPN. “I had it in my mind that this was going to be a legendary season, but I didn’t know exactly how that was going to unravel.”

The traditional traits and stories that accompany an athlete of Jeanty’s makeup are there. Yes, he’s the humble, down-to-earth star, and wouldn’t you believe that he’s also the first one in the building? Or that he is the one who doesn’t turn down an extra workout even if it’s in the snowy winter and after the season has ended?

There are the superhuman tales of his strength that follow him, too. The 320-pound bench press? That’s Jeanty. A 300-pound power clean? Jeanty. The 600-pound squat?

“He once did 605 like it was nothing and he had to be cut off,” Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson said. “He lifts with the offensive linemen.”

Yet any display of strength can often mask Jeanty’s unique speed and agility. During a run this season, he was clocked at over 22 mph. On his way to a nation-leading 1,248 yards and 17 touchdowns, he has outrun some of the fastest defensive backs in the sport and rumbled his way through entire defenses. It’s as if a semitruck could drive like a Ferrari.

“The first guy never brings him down,” Broncos running backs coach James Montgomery said. “Then he puts everybody in slow motion.”

The results have made Jeanty undeniable. Through six games, he’s on pace to break Barry Sanders’ single-season records for rushing yards (2,628) and touchdowns (37). Defenses know he’ll touch the ball over 20 times a game and have sold out to stop him. It hasn’t mattered.

“Domination,” Jeanty said of what he thinks when he runs. “To dominate whoever’s in front of me, to make them quit. And it doesn’t happen on the 10th run, it doesn’t happen on the second run. It’s usually somewhere around the 15th or 20th run.”

During a time in the sport when running backs are no longer as en vogue as they once were, Jeanty feels like a throwback. His particular combination of size, speed and intelligence has allowed Jeanty to turn what could be a monotonous ground game into a blockbuster.

Boise State — ranked No. 17 in the AP poll — has put together a 5-1 season (its only loss being to now-No. 1 Oregon) and forged a path to a College Football Playoff berth ahead of Friday’s game with UNLV. The Broncos have done it behind Jeanty, who has made a handoff one of the most exciting preludes in the sport. Once the ball is cradled against his chest and he takes the first step, anything is possible.

It’s why everyone from Idaho to Italy is watching.

Ashton Jeanty has recorded 1,248 yards and 17 touchdowns this season. Loren Orr/Getty Images

AT 3 A.M. ON a Sunday in September near the seaside town of Naples in southwest Italy, Jim Davis was barely hanging on.

There’s no shortage of espresso in this part of the world to keep the head coach of the Naples Wildcats awake — and trust me, he said, plenty is consumed — but there was something else that had him laid out on his couch instead of his bed, straddling the line between somnambulant and alert.

On the naval support base about 18 miles east of the Tyrrhenian Sea where Davis has coached since 2016, the American Forces Network allows him to tune in to Jeanty’s games. At times, with a time zone difference of anywhere from 8 to 11 hours, Davis has allowed himself to catch replays or highlights after the fact. Lately, Jeanty’s play has made the early wake-up call essential.

“It reminds me of the feeling I had before when he was here, when you know he’s got the potential to score every time he touches the ball,” Davis said.

Jeanty arrived in Italy as a 12-year-old whose father, Harry, was a commanding officer on the naval support base in Aversa, a small town near Naples. In middle school, there was no tackle football team, so Jeanty tried his hand at basketball and track and field and bided his time.

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He made the varsity football team as a freshman at Naples High and was thrust into the team’s offense. Davis’ initial reflex was to put Jeanty at quarterback. The experiment didn’t go poorly, but it was short-lived. After two games, Jeanty settled in running back, where Davis’ strategy became simple.

“This kid just needs to touch the ball every down,” Davis said. “He had the speed and power, and he was hungry for more yards. We were restricting him at quarterback. I thought, ‘I could find anybody to just hand the ball off to him.'”

The football season in Naples is short, but the journeys it took Jeanty on were not. A nine-hour bus ride to Aviano in Northeast Italy to play Naples’ closest opponent at an Air Force base there. A flight to Spain, another trip to Brussels and even an 18-hour, multiday trip to Spangdahlem, Germany, where Davis remembers having to ice and treat teammates for injuries on the bus. Some stadiums didn’t even have lights, forcing games to be played in the afternoon in the middle of the hot, humid weather. Despite it all, Jeanty dominated. In one season, he had 1,223 yards on 97 carries (over 12 yards per carry) and totaled 21 touchdowns in just six games.

“I’m trying to remember, did we lose any games?” Jeanty said. “I don’t think we lost any games.”

They were 6-0.

Even at that age, Jeanty was thinking ahead. He would take the footage of games and put together a reel of his best highlights. After his freshman year, he told his parents that he wanted to go back to the States and play football. Davis was neither surprised nor disappointed. He knew Jeanty needed exposure and that, if given the opportunity, he would flourish.

“He didn’t think that he was the best and didn’t need to work hard,” Davis said. “He was the best, but he had that desire to get better.”

Jeanty’s journey continued 5,700 miles west in Frisco, Texas. The staff at Lone Star High School didn’t know much about Jeanty beyond his highlight reel against competition abroad. But any mystery was short lived.

“Once he showed up, obviously, his physical stature, I mean, he’s built like a Greek god,” Lone Star head coach Jeff Rayburn said. “We were like, ‘Alright, I bet you can we can find something for this kid to do.'”

After two seasons of playing him all over the field on both sides of the ball and backing more experienced runners, the backfield became Jeanty’s his senior season.

“We gave him the ball and just got out of the way,” Rayburn said of Jeanty, who had over 2,000 rushing yards, over 1,000 receiving yards and 41 touchdowns that season. “He did everything for us.”

As a three-star who burst onto the scene later than most, Jeanty received offers from only two Power 4 programs — Cal and Kansas. How did a kid from Jacksonsville, who lived in Italy and Texas end up Idaho? Through his recruiting process, Jeanty was not afraid to go anywhere to pursue his dream. In Boise State, he found the right people and the right place to develop. Nowadays, Rayburn likes to joke with the Broncos coaches who visit Lone Star that he did them a favor.

“You’re welcome for not playing him full-time at running back his junior year,” Rayburn tells them. “He would have been a national recruit.”

Rayburn claims he has not been surprised by Jeanty. In fact, before this season began, he asked his former player for one thing in advance: “Just make sure when you go to New York [for the Heisman], you get me an invite to go out there with you.”

Jeanty is on pace to set records in both rushing yards and touchdowns. Loren Orr/Getty Images

THE VISITING COACHES’ booth atop Autzen Stadium is where Boise State offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter could see what Danielson wasn’t able to just yet.

Jeanty had broken through the Ducks’ defensive line and found daylight on the other side. Ten yards ahead, a lone safety awaited. Danielson thought Jeanty would be tackled. From above, Koetter saw it differently.

“It’s out,” Danielson remembered hearing Koetter say through the headset. Sure enough, Jeanty made a cut toward the right sideline, and everyone was left staring at the back of his jersey.

Throughout this season, the Broncos’ coaching staff, from their various vantage points, have tried their best to identify the exact moment when they realize that Jeanty’s runs will turn into a breakaway touchdown. Koetter’s bird’s-eye view makes him particularly well positioned to make the call. But from the sideline, Danielson and Montgomery have enjoyed the feeling of experiencing a Jeanty breakthrough with the entire team.

Sometimes, Danielson said, Jeanty’s explosiveness through the line of scrimmage has made him call his shot early. Other times, such as against Washington State, they have thought the play was over, that Jeanty was tackled, only to find that he remained upright and was running all the way to the end zone.

The way in which Jeanty has traversed the field has varied, but the results haven’t. Give him the ball, and he’ll make magic.

“We use him as a decoy. We hand him the ball, we fake it to him,” Koetter said. “I mean, he’s the centerpiece of our offense. We don’t try to hide that.”

Even as a freshman who enrolled early as a 17-year-old in 2021, Jeanty showed flashes.

“You could tell he was going to be good,” Koetter, who was an offensive analyst and eventually interim offensive coordinator in 2022, said. “But the best player in the country? Maybe not.”

Montgomery saw it coming perhaps more than most. The Broncos’ running backs coach had seen Jeanty’s progression from his freshman season through last year, when he split carries with George Holani. Jeanty was “fanatical about getting better at every aspect of the game.”

And once the team began practices for this season, Montgomery was blown away. Jeanty’s work ethic and effort have been high since his days playing for Davis in Naples or in Texas for Rayburn, who said Jeanty “only knew one speed.” This, however, was on another level.

“He came out like an animal. He was practicing hard,” he said. “Every single rep, didn’t matter what the drill was, special teams, offense. And then we got to the first scrimmage, and we’re like, ‘Nah, we better tone it back a little bit.'”

Even though they dialed back the intensity, it only increased the anticipation. Montgomery knew everyone was awaiting what Jeanty would do in the season opener.

Jeanty didn’t disappoint. He broke the school record for most rushing yards in a game and found the end zone six times. From there, he was off and running. He has now had three games of at least 200 rushing yards and four games of three or more touchdowns.

“I always say we’re chasing perfection, so that’s what we’re chasing with him,” Montgomery said. “But he’s played as close as you can get to perfect this year. “

There’s an alternate reality where Jeanty’s perfect season happens while he is wearing a different jersey. Once last season ended, the phone calls to Jeanty and his family from coaches came in droves telling them Jeanty should enter the transfer portal and play for a bigger program on a bigger stage.

Danielson, who was thrust into the interim head-coaching position last season after the Boise State fired Andy Avalos, knew what his first move needed to be once he was hired as the permanent head coach.

“Keeping him was such a huge priority for us,” Danielson said. “Beyond what he does on the field, he’s a culture changer, he’s a culture igniter.”

Jeanty didn’t want to leave. His teammates and coaches knew he could have gone anywhere, but after a single meeting between Danielson, Boise athletic director Jeramiah Dickey, Jeanty and his dad in which they outlined Jeanty’s role as well as the name, image and likeness opportunities and support the school would offer, Jeanty didn’t hesitate.

“I knew in the back of my head I was never going to leave,” Jeanty said while adding that the money was never his top priority. There are reports that Jeanty received a base compensation package of $300,000 to stay. One industry source familiar with the NIL market said Jeanty could have gotten upward of $750,000 had he opted to leave.

“Now did some of those calls about this money and this and that sound good? They sure did,” Jeanty said. “I mean, to any 19-year-old, those things would sound good. But just realizing your values and priorities was also sounding good, too. And those thoughts were stronger than the others. Doing this here means more than anything you could get somewhere else.”

If Jeanty won the Heisman, he’d be the first Group of 5 player to earn the award since 1990. Brian Losness-Imagn Images

MOST OF US will never know what it’s like to run 70 yards for a touchdown while barreling through linebackers and speeding past cornerbacks. Even Jeanty’s own teammates can only draft off the feeling from their respective positions.

Quarterback Maddux Madsen relishes having “the best seat in the house” to watch the Jeanty show. Once he hands the ball off, he watches the play develop in front of him and stands back in awe.

“As soon as he gets past the first level and second level, I’m just like, all right, I probably could realistically just walk to the sideline,” Madsen said. “It’d be totally fine.”

Wide receiver Latrell Caples can never truly see the play in real time. While focused on blocking, he often has to rely on the video board or the highlight reels postgame to fully appreciate the latest offering from Jeanty.

“I’ve never seen anybody do the stuff he does at practice, let alone the game,” Caples said.

Defensive end Ahmed Hassanein joked that while he enjoys watching Jeanty dominate from the sideline, it also means that the defense has to go back out on the field sooner.

“Somebody needs to stop him, because I need a break on the sideline,” Hassanein joked. “One attempt, and he already scores, so I’m like, ‘Damn, that’s good, but give me some time. I need a breather.”

Jeanty’s roommate, safety Zion Washington, has a unique perspective, too. As a defender, he has seen firsthand how hard it is to contain him.

“I would hate to play against him in a game,” Washington said. “The things he does is just different — you don’t see them from a regular back.”

Washington, a high school friend of Jeanty’s, has seen the running back go from a confident, quiet kid to the center of attention. The guy who often asks Washington to keep the apartment clean and trash-talks during games is also the one who now makes their Sunday church trips longer. Everyone there wants to talk to him or take a picture.

“It is hard sometimes to see all the positivity around me, all the attention,” Jeanty said. “I’m not really a guy that wants attention. If you ask anybody about me, I’m chill. I’m an out-the-way type of guy. I don’t really need all the spotlight on me, but it’s cool for what I’m doing to be able to have that.”

A natural byproduct of success on the field is success and fame off it. But Jeanty’s eye-popping runs and stats have brought about a reverence and even an obsession from the college football world and beyond that harkens back to his days in Europe.

“I remember being in Belgium, that was an international school we played, and it was funny how many parents and moms came up to him from the opposing team wanting to take pictures,” Davis said. “They were like, ‘You’re going to be famous one day.'”

Now, he is.

His teammates don’t let him forget that he’s just one of them even if they can’t go anywhere on their phones without seeing praise being heaped on their friend.

“I’m scrolling through my phone. Everything’s Ashton. Everything’s Ashton,” Washington said. “One day we were just chilling and Kevin Durant followed him. He was like, ‘KD just followed.’ We’re like, ‘What?’ That’s not normal. We go through things like that. It’s just like, that’s crazy. But it doesn’t faze him.”

For Washington, it’s validating to witness it all happen after he was part of the conversations aimed at keeping Jeanty in Bronco colors. Now, his guy — their guy — has the potential to be the first Group of 5 Heisman winner since BYU’s Ty Detmer in 1990 and the sixth first-round draft selection from Boise State. For some, it might be too early to start thinking about how they will be remembered. Not Jeanty. He has made the Heisman and the NFL his long-term goals, and he has already launched a football scholarship in his name for future players.

“We told him, ‘You can do something that no one’s ever done,'” Washington said. “‘You could do things out here in this city where you’ve already been accomplishing big goals that no one has ever, ever done. You could break records here and win the Heisman here. That’s a legacy.'”

Boise State is 5-1 this season. Brian Losness-Imagn Images

WHEN IT COMES to one of his iconic runs, no one has the vantage point that Jeanty does. So after a recent Boise State practice, I asked Jeanty to put me there — inside his helmet, yes — but more importantly inside his brain as he takes the ball and launches into one of these runs that are a staple of his highlight reels.

Of course, Jeanty quickly points out that I have gotten ahead of myself. It does not begin when the ball touches his hands but rather well before the ball is even snapped. His stance, which he notes that some people have joked about because of its stoic posture, is part of the method to his madness.

“I’m just back there relaxed,” Jeanty said. “I’m just analyzing the defense, I’m seeing what type of front we’re getting, the linebacker placement, not too worried about the corners, but really the safeties to see the shell of the coverage and see what we’re running against.”

In the span of less than a minute, Jeanty is analyzing which defenders he’ll likely have to run through and which he’ll have to make miss, as well as how the run might affect the defensive line based on their placement. Each run has a key and a read on a defender he’ll have to make to determine how it changes “my fit to the run.” The goal, he said, is to be ready to troubleshoot once the play begins.

“If anything goes wrong or they fit it differently than I think they will or whatever it may be, I kind of already analyzed it before so I’m able then to react,” Jeanty said. “And football, especially running back, it is all reaction based after the ball snaps.”

Hear him speak further on the matter and you’ll realize that the way his roommates describe him — “extremely neat” — translates onto the football field. When he’s running downfield, the way he has studied opposing safeties’ movements and tendencies allows him to make an instinct-based but informed view on whether he’ll try to run through them with force or around them with speed.

“That’s the easy part,” Jeanty said. “I feel like people kind of skip past this, but I played defense a lot of my career, so I know what the defensive guys think when he comes downhill to tackle.”

When Jeanty reaches the end zone these days, the feeling is a familiar one. He has experienced it 17 times this season. The records, accolades and praise are nice, he said, but what he’s chasing goes beyond anything tangible and back to the sensation that set him on this path, one he still remembers to this day.

“After I scored my first touchdown [as a running back], I was in sixth grade and it was just a unique feeling,” Jeanty said. “I was like, ‘Man, I got to have this feeling for a while. I got to keep doing this.'”

Whatever happens this season for Boise, bigger things await for Jeanty. An invitation to New York for the Heisman ceremony seems inevitable, and Jeanty is also projected as a top-15 NFL draft pick.

For now, Jeanty is zeroed in on what’s immediately ahead: winning the following game, maximizing another run, overpowering more defenders and reaching the next end zone.

Even if his demeanor might not always show it, Jeanty’s confidence is at an all-time high, and who can blame him?

No one has been able to stop him.

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