Glendale, Ariz. • It mostly has been forgotten by this point, but Boise State generated a recruiting stir last offseason. Before Ashton Jeanty morphed into the reincarnation of Tecmo Bowl Bo Jackson and before the team barrelled its way to a 12-win season and a first-round bye in the 12-team College Football Playoff, the Broncos signed former five-star quarterback Malachi Nelson out of the transfer portal from USC.
Nelson was a top-15 prospect in the 2023 recruiting class, and his arrival in Boise in January was considered a minor coup for the Broncos, a five-star talent joining a Group of 5 roster with a full carton of eligibility remaining.
The starting quarterback job in 2024 wasn’t going to be handed to Nelson under Spencer Danielson, entering his first full season as the coach at Boise State, but plenty of assumptions were made by those on the outside looking in.
That was until sophomore Maddux Madsen, a former three-star prospect out of Utah, won the starting role and proved all those assumptions wrong. Madsen, whose only Division I offers were to New Mexico and Boise State out of high school, flashed some promise as a backup in 2023 and built off that during the offseason, beating out Nelson in the preseason. The only ones who weren’t surprised were those who saw it every day.
“He was the best player,” offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter said of Madsen. “Everyone wants to think there must be some magic because he beat out a five-star, and this is nothing against Malachi, but what coach isn’t going to play the best player? Maddux was the best player.”
Even after starting all 13 games for the Mountain West champion Broncos and earning the No. 3 seed in the Playoff, Madsen continues to float under the radar. On most teams, the quarterback is front and center, the leading role for better or worse. That’s not the case at Boise State this season as everyone exists in Jeanty’s shadow, quarterback included. That’s just fine with Madsen.
“Obviously, the quarterback position carries a lot of pressure, but I don’t enjoy attention, so I like having someone like Ashton to take it all,” Madsen said. “And he deserves it because he’s the best player in college football.”
Madsen has proven to be a complementary fit with Jeanty, in personality and production, although his “Maddog” nickname is a bit of a misnomer considering his basset-hound temperament. The son of a former college baseball coach, Madsen had to convince his mom to sign him up for youth league football one weekend when his dad was out of town on a road trip. Madsen and his five siblings are named after baseball players — he’s named after pitcher Greg Maddux — and Madsen won three baseball state titles in high school.
On the football field, Madsen registered a solid if unspectacular season in 2024. He has a respectable 62 percent completion rate, but it has oscillated between 84 percent against Utah State and 45 percent against Nevada. He averaged 208.8 passing yards per game (2,714 total) to balance the offense’s 250.5 rushing yards per game, although the most important stat for the Broncos is Madsen’s 22-to-3 touchdown-to-interception ratio. That’s the fewest number of interceptions thrown among FBS quarterbacks with at least 300 attempts in 2024, and Boise State’s eight total turnovers are tied for the second-fewest lost in FBS.
With Jeanty in the backfield, a quarterback who takes care of the ball is paramount.
“He doesn’t turn the ball over. On some teams, you don’t necessarily need your quarterback to win the game for you, but the quarterback can’t lose the game for you,” Koetter said. “We’re a run-first team, we have the best running back in the country. So your quarterback has to manage the game, make the plays he should make. Those are all things that Maddog does a great job at.”
Madsen might be known best as the quarterback who hands the ball to Jeanty, but his coaches and teammates have noted the strides he has made this season, his first as a full-time starter.
“The amount of work he puts in the film room, his football IQ has skyrocketed,” left tackle Kage Casey said. “It goes back to his offseason training, getting his footwork right, his pocket awareness. He knows every spot on the field.”
That has helped Madsen grow his confidence, something that will be crucial next season without Jeanty if he decides to leave for the NFL. (Nelson entered the portal earlier this month and left the team before the Playoff.) As much as Madsen has been happy to stand next to Jeanty’s spotlight, he knows a chunk of the responsibility Jeanty has shouldered — as a player and leader — likely will fall to him in 2025.
(Photo courtesy of Maddux Madsen) At American Fork High School, Maddux Madsen was a baseball and football star.
“The quarterback has that position of leadership, so once Ashton is gone, I have to step forward and do better,” Madsen said. “I feel like I’ve been an underdog my entire life, and that’s built up my confidence.”
That same underdog persona has permeated the entire Boise State team this season, part of a “blue-collar, count us out” mentality Danielson has instilled, particularly along the offensive line. Most offensive lines embrace that sense of pride that comes with doing the anonymous, dirty work in the trenches, but this Broncos unit has leaned in as a group tasked with clearing running lanes for Jeanty despite suffering multiple injuries and facing lineup shuffling this season.
Casey, a second-team All-American, and super-senior, first-team All-Mountain West guard Ben Dooley have anchored the left side, but the other three spots have been a constant rotation of semi-healthy bodies, resulting in 10 starters and six starting combinations along the front. None of it has hindered Jeanty’s production.
“It shows how close this group is as a whole, to be able to have as many different starting configurations as we did,” offensive line coach Tim Keane said. “They spend a lot of time together watching film, going through calls, going through how to ID the fronts, seeing blitz adjustments. So when we’ve had someone go down in the middle of a game, the next guy was able to go in without a huge drop-off.”
Jeanty’s stats have been superhuman and hard-earned, including 1,889 yards after contract (5.5 yards per carry) and 143 forced missed tackles, all tops in the FBS among qualified rushers. But when a team relies on the run as much as Boise State does, the offensive line still needs to create even the slightest of pushes and creases against stacked boxes and aggressive defenses to give Jeanty space to dominate. It didn’t result in a Joe Moore Award nomination, given to college football’s top offensive line, and there was very little national recognition beyond Casey’s All-America nods, but the Broncos’ front is happy to let Jeanty’s numbers do the talking.
“The only stats we get are bad — sacks, penalties, games missed — but our stats are his stats,” said Mason Randolph, who started games at center and right guard while battling injuries this season. “If he’s doing a good job, that means we’re doing a good job.”
What Jeanty has meant to Boise State this season provided the offensive line with a little extra edge, and it was determined to allow its star running back to have the season he deserved. It has been a close-knit relationship between Jeanty and his blockers all year, including an offseason bet in which Randolph told Jeanty that if he got more than 2,000 rushing yards, Randolph would get the final total tattooed on his body. It was a bet Randolph was determined to lose.
“Those guys love Ashton. They want to do everything they can to fight, scratch and claw to make sure Ashton is successful, in large part because of how hard Ashton works, in the shadows, when no one is looking,” Keane said. “It shows what kind of person Ashton is that he demands that kind of respect.”
Randolph said once the season is over, he’ll get Jeanty’s final tally and his signature tattooed on his leg. He hasn’t asked or pressured any others to join in, but Dooley is considering it.
“My body would actually be worth more if I got Ashton’s signature tattooed onto me,” he said.
If Boise State’s season and Jeanty’s pursuit of the single-season rushing record are to continue beyond Tuesday night’s Fiesta Bowl and the CFP quarterfinals, it no doubt will require another noteworthy performance by Jeanty, along with a rise to the occasion by Madsen and the offensive line. No. 6 Penn State has one of the best rush defenses in the country, limiting opponents to 100 yards per game and 3.1 yards per carry, both well below Jeanty’s averages, and it’s in the top 10 in tackles for loss.
The Nittany Lions are also fresh off forcing SMU into three interceptions and scoring a pair of defensive touchdowns in the first round of the CFP. Danielson said Penn State rush end Abdul Carter is the best defensive player his team has faced all season, and Koetter said the Lions have four defensive ends who would start for most teams in the country.
Boise State has made a name (and legacy) for itself as the underdog who slays dragons on the big stage. If another Fiesta Bowl victory awaits the Broncos, Madsen will need to connect on those one or two play-action opportunities when Jeanty freezes the safeties, and make the smart, safe plays that hold on to the ball and keep drives alive. The offensive line will need to give Jeanty room to operate and allow Madsen an extra tick in the pocket on third-and-long.
“We always are finding ways to put a chip on our shoulder,” Keane said. “That’s been the thing here at Boise State — everyone thinks they’re better than us. We’re the little brother and little kid on the block. Until they play us. Then they figure it out real quick.”
No one is overlooking Jeanty, including Penn State. But if Boise State pulls off yet another upset, it probably means Madsen and the big boys up front seized an opportunity to make a name for themselves.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
