Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty is the best running back in college football this season, with the stats and the hardware to prove it.
Jeanty’s ever-churning legs are the biggest — but not only — reasons why the Broncos stormed to a 12-1 record, the Mountain West Conference championship and the No. 3 seed in the 12-team College Football Playoff.
Yet when Jeanty is on the sideline on New Year’s Eve as Boise State faces sixth-seeded Penn State (12-2) in the Fiesta Bowl in Glendale, Arizona, he might be looking at the top running back tandem in college football.
At least, that’s the way the Nittany Lions duo of Kaytron Allen and Nick Singleton look at it.
“We always say we’re the best backfield in the nation,” Singleton said. “We stand on it.”
They are attempting to run with it, too. Singleton and Allen combined for 160 rushing yards and three touchdowns in a dominant 38-10 win over No. 11 seed SMU (11-3) on Saturday in the CFP’s first round, putting on the kind of physical performance that tends to travel pretty well this time of year.
Allen sprinted to the end zone from 25 yards out in the second quarter to put the Nittany Lions up 21-0. His 4-yard burst early in the fourth put Penn State up 35 to give their fans an early start on pricing out tickets for the trip to Arizona.
In between, Singleton provided a thudding 1-yard score that left the 6-foot, 226-pound junior roaring. He took the handoff from Drew Allar, followed a lead block from Cooper Cousins and slammed into a SMU defender after crossing the goal line.
Singleton ran to the sideline and was greeted by James Franklin, leading to an exchange — punctuated by a few words not suitable for family audiences — in which Singleton reminded the Nittany Lions coach of how “violent” he can be as a running back.
“I’m trying to be a more physical runner, run through someone when the extra man is there,” Singleton said.
In that way, he and Allen are just following running back coach JaJuan Seider’s orders. All he wants on a given running play is for the blockers to “leave one” for the back to beat. If that happens, the Nittany Lions like their chances, no matter which one happens to have the ball in his hands at the moment.
There was plenty to like against SMU, which came in with a defense ranked in the top 10 in the country against the run. While it took Penn State a while to get going, after early interception returns for touchdowns by Dominic DeLuca and Tony Rojas staggered the Mustangs, Allen and Singleton spent most of the next two quarters finishing SMU off.
Yet it’s telling of just how special a season Jeanty is having that the combined rushing yardage by Allen and Singleton — 1,820 through 14 games — is still nearly 700 yards shy of the 2,497 that Boise State’s Heisman runner-up produced by himself.
Jeanty has been able to gain yards no matter the opponent. Yet he will face perhaps his stiffest test this season when he takes on a Penn State defense that bounced back from a shaky performance against No. 1 Oregon in the Big Ten title game earlier this month by limiting SMU to a season-low 253 yards, including just 58 on the ground.
“I truly believe we are the best defense in the country by far, by any means,” senior defensive tackle Dvon J-Thomas said.
Slowing down Jeanty — who has not rushed for less than 127 yards in a game this season — will give the Nittany Lions a chance to prove it on a national stage.
And it will give Allen and Singleton an opportunity to prove that sometimes in the running game, two backs are better than one.