Ashton Jeanty just got another reason to silence all the haters in his College Football Playoff debut this week. Jeanty was snubbed of the Heisman Trophy as the voters valued Travis Hunter’s two-way ability over Jeanty’s historic rushing season.
Because of that, he probably already felt he had to prove why he should have won. Now, Cam Skattebo has poured gasoline all over the Jeanty fire after he talked ahead of Arizona State’s clash with Texas in the CFP quarterfinals.
“I don’t like speaking on other players, but I'm in one of the four biggest conferences in the country, and I'm doing it at the highest level, it’s simple. I believe that I'm the best because I always think I'm the best,” Skattebo said during a Zoom news conference, per Max Zepeda.
Zepeda works for The Walter Cronkite Sports Network at ASU. He posted the video to his X platform account, formerly known as Twitter.
Cam Skattebo is right to be confident, but wrong to compare his season to Ashton Jeanty’s
I applaud Skattebo for his confidence. He earned the right to be confident the way he ran all over Iowa State in the Big 12 championship. But let’s not get it twisted — Jeanty is still the better back. Boise State's consistently rushed for 100-plus yards this season, sometimes 200-plus. Jeanty didn’t have a game with less than 127 rushing yards while Skattebo had seven games with more than 127 rushing yards this season, meaning he went under that numner almost half the time.
And yes, the Big 12 is a better conference than the Mountain West, but there also needs to be context. Every Big 12 team this season averaged at least 117 or more rushing yards per game this year. So yeah, Skattebo isn't necessarily going up against SEC and Big Ten defenses at ASU.
Of the six games where Skattebo rushed for at least 140 yards against conference opponents, every team was ranked at least 12th — or worse — in the conference in rushing yards allowed per game. The only teams ranked better than that were BYU and Utah.
The only non-conference game he rushed for more than 140 was against Mississippi State and they were statistically the worst team in the conference. So yeah, Skattebo is a great back — but he’s no Jeanty.
Sure, the Mountain West is an easier conference to play in, but what Jeanty did has nothing to do with the conference size or skill. He was flat-out the best running back in the country; bar none.
Even against Oregon, he rushed for nearly 200 yards and helped Boise State stay in a game they lost by a field goal. With what Jeanty did, the conference argument is pointless. Because if that’s the case, the stat leaders in each category would be saturated with non-Power 4 conference players.
I understand where Skattebo is coming from. He’s allowed to be confident in himself and believe in himself and I think that’s the point he was trying to make. But don’t get it twisted, Jeanty was a beast this year, regardless of the conference opponents.