On a practice field on the edge of a thousand-year-old city, Jim Davis handed the high school freshman a football and told him his goal. It was to impress upon the senior linebacker on the other side of the offensive line that this new member of the Naples Wildcats would not be tossed to the turf without a fight. Ashton Jeanty nodded and waited eagerly for the snap.
“Ashton picked a hole, went through it and he, forgive my French, put the kid right on his ass,” said Davis, the Wildcats’ head coach. “Until you see a kid get that first hit, you never know. That first hit took away all the doubt.”
Before Jeanty introduced himself to the country with the imposing, relentless running style that made him an early favorite for the Heisman Trophy at Boise State, he was a rookie on the football team at a U.S. Navy base in the ancient town of Aversa, Italy, 15 miles north of Naples. His father, Harry, who was serving in the Navy as a commanding officer, was transferred there before Ashton started seventh grade. It was there, in a town known for producing some of Italy’s best buffalo mozzarella, sparkling white wine and an abundance of Catholic churches, that Jeanty took his first real steps toward stardom.
“There,” said Harry Jeanty, “was Ashton in heaven.”
Ashton Jeanty (center) played soccer in Italy before his family moved to Texas. (Courtesy of Jim Davis)
Through the first two weeks of the 2024 season, Jeanty leads the nation in yards rushing (459), rushing touchdowns (nine) and forced missed tackles (22). A week after his stunning 267-yard, six-touchdown performance at Georgia Southern, Jeanty followed it up by punishing an Oregon defense considered by many to be one of the best in the country for 192 yards and three touchdowns in a 37-34 near-up that came down to a last-second made field goal by Oregon.
Jeanty had the most rushing yards by a visiting player at Autzen Stadium since Washington’s Myles Gaskin in 2016. The loss didn’t stop the Boise State star from believing in his team’s performance this year.
“We have one of the best teams in the country,” Jeanty said after the game. “We came up short, but whoever we play in the next 10 games, we’re going to dominate.”
#RB1 Ashton Jeanty currently leads the FBS in…
Running yards: 459
Rushing TD’s: 9
Forced missed tackles: 22 photo.twitter.com/uRJyGNMhmG— Dane Brugler (@dpbrugler) September 9, 2024
Jeanty, like that poor senior linebacker of old, runs through everything in front of him. Often, he simply pings off confused defenders who can’t match his downhill power and keeps going. At 5-foot-9 and 215 pounds, the junior running back is not only absurdly strong — he can squat 600 pounds — but he’s also been timed to hit 22.5 mph in games. He’s considered the No. 1 running back prospect for the 2025 NFL Draft by The Athletics‘s concept expert Dane Brugler.
Brugler rightly wrote in his scouting report: “That man hates being tackled.”
Yeah, that pretty much sums him up. At least on the field. His path to becoming Boise State’s next great running back and one of the best players in the country didn’t start with him being hyped by recruiting services across the country at a young age.
The Naples Wildcats had to take a nine-hour bus ride to meet the nearest team, at an air base in Aviano at the foot of the Dolomite Mountains. There were side trips to play at an Army base near Venice. They flew commercially to Rota, Spain, to play the team at the Navy base there. And one game involved an 18-hour bus ride to Spangdahlem, Germany. They usually slept on the gym floor Friday nights before playing on Saturday and finally the long trip back to southern Italy.
Davis said his roster is usually around 30 players each year, so everyone plays offense and defense. Jeanty played everywhere and was in a league of his own even as a freshman. But before the start of his sophomore year in 2019, the family found out they would be moving to the United States, to the Dallas area.
“My wife immediately said, ‘Oh, what a shame you’re losing him!’” Davis recalls, “And I said, ‘No, he needs to go back and be exposed.’”
That June, Lone Star High School coach Jeff Rayburn received two emails informing him that a new student and potential addition to the team was en route from Italy to the school in Frisco, Texas. It was a first.
“We didn’t know anything about him,” Rayburn said, “but when he showed up, we found out pretty quickly.”
Jeanty joined a Lone Star team loaded with star talent, including future NFL players Marvin Mims Jr. and Jaylan Ford. In his sophomore year, he played wherever Rayburn’s staff needed him, from safety to linebacker to slot receiver to defensive end. As a junior, he split running back reps with Jaden Nixon, who later went to Oklahoma State before transferring to Western Michigan. And Jeanty often terrorized defenses as a slot receiver with his elusiveness. When Jeanty’s senior season arrived, he finally became Lone Star’s RB1. And from there, he made his mark.
Jeanty threw for 41 touchdowns in 12 games his senior year. He rushed for 1,843 yards on 229 carries, averaging 8 yards per carry. He owned Class 5A football in Texas, but offers from top prospects weren’t exactly coming. Boise State extended an offer in May 2021. Before that, offers came from Navy, Dartmouth, Cal, New Mexico and Penn. The only schools in the state to offer Jeanty were Texas State, Sam Houston State and North Texas.
“The way recruiting is these days, if you don’t get drafted as a junior, the Texases, Alabamas, Georgias have already determined who they want,” Rayburn said. “I think if Ashton had been a full-time running back as a junior, he wouldn’t have ended up at Boise. I think he would have ended up at a Power 4 school.”
Jeanty committed to Boise State in the fall of his senior season. And when he arrived at Boise the following year, he made an immediate impact, rushing for 821 yards and seven touchdowns as a freshman in 2022, replacing incumbent George Holani. Then came the jump in his sophomore year, when Jeanty established himself as one of the standouts of last year’s season, rushing for 1,347 yards and 14 touchdowns despite missing two games with injury.
The Broncos won the Mountain West Conference title last year, but only after dealing with the season-ending firing of head coach Andy Avalos in November. Three weeks later, they were in Las Vegas to lift the MWC trophy after beating UNLV 44-20. Jeanty had a game-high 153 yards.
But even before the blue and orange confetti rained down on Allegiant Stadium, Boise State was already in a battle to keep its star player happy at home.
“Before we won the MWC championship game, the amount of illegal manipulation that was going on with Ashton, with his family, with him, with position coaches, head coaches calling him … he was bombarded,” Boise State coach Spencer Danielson said. “He was like, ‘Coach, I want to be here. I want to be a part of this family and help this team win games. This is what I committed to when I came out of high school, this is what I stand for.’ And he hasn’t looked back since.”
When asked exactly how many teams showed up, Jeanty laughed, “No, but let’s just say there were a lot.”
Harry Jeanty said the attention was overwhelming, but also expected.
“I think people are inclined to jump where the money is right now. Does that make sense to them? Probably,” he said. “But for Ashton, I’ve always told him to stay humble, work hard, and everything will fall into place. It makes sense for him to be at Boise because, look, someone can offer you any amount of money — and there were a lot of offers — you can take those offers, but when you get on campus, do you really know what’s going to happen?”
It didn’t stop with Jeanty and his family.
“I got a lot of calls trying to get Ashton out of there and people telling me they were offering him this, that or the other,” Rayburn said.
What coaches who loved the idea of Jeanty on their defense failed to understand was that the military guy who had lived through Virginia, Florida, Texas and even Italy had finally found a place he could call home.
“The love for my team and for this program, that’s what keeps me here,” he said. “The people in this city. Nothing is better than what I have here at Boise State. No amount of money can ever compare to that.”
Money doesn’t hurt, though. Boise sports radio host Mike Prater reported for three days After winning the MWC title, Jeanty was given a new name, image and likeness, including $300,000, housing and a car to stay blue.
“I was glad they did that because Ashton obviously deserved every penny they gave him because he would have gotten three or four times as much elsewhere,” Harry Jeanty said. “But it’s not just about the money. It’s about Ashton being in the right place and making a difference.”
Danielson confirmed that Jeanty was offered “substantially more” to leave. He chose to stay, making the Broncos once again a team to beat in the MWC and an outsider candidate to make a run at the new 12-team College Football Playoff.
“The people here have embraced him,” Danielson said. “Ashton Jeanty is going to be a household name here for the rest of his life.”
And the rest of the country is also aware.
To be worthy of the #HEI2MANyou must be #BuiltDifferentlyhttps://t.co/2fDkCvClio#BleedingBlue photo.twitter.com/RgfmK1rZ6h
— Boise State Football (@BroncoSportsFB) August 28, 2024
Jeanty’s stunning start came on the heels of a Boise State Heisman campaign that got underway earlier than most on Aug. 28. The athletic department knew it had to get Jeanty’s name out there early as a Group of 5 school whose star could disappear into the Heisman haze come October or November. Keeping the nation’s attention won’t be easy, but if the numbers hold up, the sport has no choice.
Alabama’s Derrick Henry was the last running back to win the trophy in 2015. The last time a G5 player was invited to New York City as a Heisman Trophy finalist was in 2013, when Northern Illinois QB Jordan Lynch was on the list.
His nine rushing touchdowns are the most by any FBS player through the first two weeks of the season since Ricky Williams at Texas in 1998 — the same year Williams lifted the Heisman. Jeanty isn’t afraid of any kind of jinx. Quite the opposite, in fact. He welcomes the hype machine he now powers with his burly frame.
In the end zone he came to know so well at Georgia Southern in the season opener, Jeanty lifted his right leg, extended his right arm and punched the first Heisman pose of the season. There will surely be more to come in the coming weeks if he keeps running through whatever lies ahead.
(Photo: Tom Hauck/Getty Images)
