Do you feel Ashton Jeanty deserves the Heisman Trophy? One season ago, no one expected a star to emerge from the Mountain West conference. But on Monday, Boise State produced a Heisman Trophy finalist alongside Travis Hunter, Dillon Gabriel, and Cam Ward. And that came after the Broncos dominated UNLV 21-7 in the conference championship game last Friday. But as the Heisman competition heats up, Boise State HC revealed one unspoken incident that makes Ashton Jeanty a worthy contender. 

If it’s anybody, it’s the HC who knows Ashton Jeanty has it in him to be crowned the Heisman winner. On December 12, David Pollack shared a video of Spencer Danielson on X recounting an incident that happened in last year’s fall camp. The HC shared how a frustrated Jeanty requested a players-only meeting, saying “the urgency tonight in this walkthrough wasn’t it.” Danielson narrated, “So I set up a players-only meeting the next day, no coaches involved. And Ash led the whole thing. And the amount of our players that called me after and said ‘Coach we needed that. Like Ash sets the standard for us. We can’t take any days off, especially walkthroughs.”

Who understands a college football player more than a fellow teammate? Ashton Jeanty first started playing football as a quarterback, but was moved to the running back position after two games at Great Bridge Middle School in Virginia. But he eventually moved to Texas and played HS football at Lone Star High School, rushing for 1,843 yards and 41 touchdowns in his senior year. It was a good thing for Boise State when he joined them in 2022. 

For both the 2022 and 2023 seasons, Ashton Jeanty split playing time with former Broncos RB George Holani. Still, he received the Mountain West Offensive Player of the Year title last season after leading Boise State with 1,347 rushing yards and 14 touchdowns coupled with 569 receiving yards, the most for an RB in the nation. But his real talent came into focus when he finally took the starting nod in 2024 to make it a record-breaking season.

Ashton Jeanty’s dominance in 2024

With the fourth-highest single-season record of 2,497 rushing yards and 29 touchdowns, Ashton Jeanty deserves huge credit for leading Boise State to a first-round bye as the No. 3 seed in the first 12-team playoff structure. He also broke other records, including a career total of 4,665 yards, eight games with 200+ yards, and 21 games with 100+ yards. 

This season could also see RB Barry Sanders losing something he has been holding for 37 years. Jeanty is just 132 yards shy of beating Sanders’ legendary single-season rushing record of 2,628. With his productive season, the 21-year-old secured the highest single-season rushing grade of 97.5 on Pro Football Focus since 2014. A good case for the Heisman! But Travis Hunter could change the narrative. We never know. 

We’ll only know for sure when the winner of the 90th Heisman Trophy is revealed on December 14 in New York at the Jazz at the Lincoln Center.