Ashton Jeanty is dominating college football and on track to have a record-breaking season as a running back.
'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.
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? The results have made Jeanty undeniable. Through six games, he's on pace to break Barry Sanders' single-season records for rushing yards and touchdowns . Defenses know he'll touch the ball over 20 times a game and have sold out to stop him. It hasn't mattered.
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. "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.'"
"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.'" "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."
Sometimes, Danielson said, Jeanty's explosiveness through the line of scrimmage has made him call his shot early. Other times, such as against, 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. 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.
"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." 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.
"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."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.
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. "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.'"to one of his iconic runs, no one has the vantage point that Jeanty does.
"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."
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