Ashton Jeanty has been among the top Heisman Trophy candidates all year. The Boise State running back came on relatively early in the season and has simply done nothing but build upon his résumé.

Despite coming from a small program, Jeanty has put together a season that is right up there with the most recent running backs to take home college football’s most prestigious honor for an individual player. The last three running backs to win the Heisman Trophy were Alabama’s Derrick Henry (2015), Alabama’s Mark Ingram (2009), and USC’s Reggie Bush (2005).

Heading into Friday’s game against the Oregon State Beavers, Jeanty averaged 7.5 yards per rush, 2,062 total rushing yards, and 27 rushing touchdowns on the 2024 season.

That’s a higher average yards per attempt than Henry (6.1) and Ingram (6.8) had through the first 11 games in the years they won the Heisman, and not terribly far behind Bush (8.6). Jeanty exceeded all three of them by a healthy margin in rushing yards, with Henry tallying 1,526 yards in that category while Ingram (1,399) and Bush (1,398) were well behind Jeanty.

Jeanty also led in total rushing touchdowns (27), with Henry (21), Ingram (12), and (13) trailing by a large margin through 11 games there as well.

To add to all of these totals will be the 106 rushing yards and 1 rushing touchdown that Jeanty currently has to his name as the Broncos lead the Beavers, 21-7 through the first half of Friday’s game.

Jeanty is viewed as the primary threat to Colorado two-way star Travis Hunter in the Heisman race. At the time of publication, Jeanty was listed at +3000 to win the Heisman on FanDuel. Hunter is -10000.