Profile: Paul Igboeli
At 6-1 and 205 pounds, Paul Igboeli isn’t the prototypical linebacker, and he’ll be the first to admit it. But whatever the Western Athletic Conference Freshman of the Year lacks in size, he makes up for with speed, confidence and an ability to visualize success and make it happen.
“I don’t think anybody’s better than me,” Igboeli said. “I feel if you’re not confident in yourself, how can you go out and play?”
Igboeli, who was also an honorable mention Freshman All-American, spends his days dreaming about making big hits, interceptions and scoring touchdowns.
“If you think you can do it, it’s probably going to happen,” he said. “I’ve found that thinking about it before you do it really does help.”
He started in only eight games, but Igboeli made his share of plays on the field, recording 69 tackles, which was second on the team. But he wasn’t satisfied with his performance.
“Really, to tell you the truth, I was a little disappointed in myself,” Igboeli said. “I know how I can play, and I think I can play a lot better.” Although his play earned him several accolades, which he is very happy about, Igboeli is looking to step up his play next season.
“Am I just going to be a starter, that’s it, or am I going to be someone very important to the team? You know, I’m trying to be that,” Igboeli said. “I’m not just trying to be another guy just out there playing. There’s a lot of people who get mixed up in the shuffle … You only notice a couple of people, and I want to be one of those people that you notice. I don’t want to be someone that blends in with the crowd.”
Igboeli knows he will have to stand out to achieve his ultimate goal, playing in the National Football League. And he’s working towards this goal by putting on weight and improving his speed.
It will take hard work, but Igboeli said he’s prepared to do it. He said he puts in a lot of work some people don’t see, like extra running and push-ups.
Even with all the hard work, at 205 pounds Igboeli knows his size will be a problem, and he’s fully aware of the possibility he may have to switch positions and play safety in the NFL. But being undersized doesn’t bother him.
“As for now, I’m using what I have to my advantage,” he said. “I’m not going to say, ‘I’m too small, so I can’t play.’ OK, that’s a defeatist attitude. I’m like, ‘I’m too small. Therefore I need to get faster so I can still compete at a high level with everyone else.'”
Besides speed, another important part of Igboeli’s game is making the big hit. But he stresses the importance of making the sure tackle and only taking the big hit if it’s there.
“I like to strike fear in people’s hearts,” Igboeli said. “And if I’m not doing that I’m obviously doing something wrong. I’m not an evil guy, but I mean, I do like it when I hit somebody and he doesn’t get up… I like to see that, I really do. I’m not evil. I don’t know, it just does something for me. It just boasts my confidence level. I’m like, ‘Man, I can really hit.'”
Igboeli is from Grand Prairie, Texas, and can attribute much of his game to his tempering in the fire that is Texas high school football.
“Football is king in Texas,” he said. “That’s where I come from, and that’s what made me like this today.”
People are always having pick-up tackle football games, Igboeli said. There are old people and young people all playing together without any pads.
He also learned a lot of important lessons from Texas high school football. While in high school, Igboeli’s coaches taught him the importance of speed in football.
“The way our coach put it, if they can’t catch you, they can’t block you. They can be as big as they wanna be, but if you’re faster than ’em, then you get ’em. Speed kills,” he said.
Also during high school, Igboeli developed relationships with his teammates that still provide him with an important support system. He said he still talks to a lot of his old teammates, who are now playing for various Division-I schools throughout the nation. They call him “mountain boy,” because many of them are still in the plains of Texas or Oklahoma.
High school also prepared Igboeli for the pressures of playing football at a college level. In Texas, there are college-sized crowds of 40,000 plus at home football games, so Igboeli wasn’t nervous about playing in front of big crowds.
And the competition level of college football wasn’t much of a step up for Igboeli either. He said there were six players from his high school defense and a lot of other players from other high schools that went to D-I schools.
But there were some adjustments Igboeli had to make to college life, especially in Logan.
“I’m a dude that had a lot of fun in high school,” he said. “I’m used to the club scene and whatnot. We don’t got enough clubs around here. You know, that’s good. It’s like a safe little city and whatnot, but I’m not really used to that.”
He’s also not used to the weather and not having a car.
“I wouldn’t want to wreck my car over here, because I don’t really know how to drive in no snow or no ice,” Igboeli said. “I wouldn’t want to take that chance. I’ll let the people who are experienced do that.”
Despite the different climate and the lack of a spectacular night life, Igboeli seems satisfied with his choice to come to USU.
“You don’t have to go somewhere big to make a difference and be a big name player. You could come here and make a difference earlier,” he said. “Let me see if I can make a difference up here and get closer to realizing my goal, making the NFL…The league will find you.”
Although he wasn’t heavily recruited, USU wasn’t the only school looking at Igboeli. Tulsa also showed some interest.
“[Tulsa] came at me so late. I knew that someone they were trying to get went somewhere else, and they just wanted me to fill in his spot or whatever. I’m like, ‘I’m not going nowhere to fill in nobody’s spot. I’m going somewhere to make a difference,'” Igboeli said. “Utah State really, really wanted me.”
So far, the relationship seems to have worked out swimmingly for Igboeli and USU. And his play on the field has shown those who overlooked him what they missed out on.
“That is the best feeling in the world. I’m like, ‘Looky here, look at me now.’ You really want to make them feel stupid,” he said.
Igboeli thinks the season he had can show others like him, who may not have been heavily recruited, that they can come somewhere and make a difference early in their careers.
As a sophomore, Igboeli hopes to be an All-American and one of the top five linebackers in the nation.
And in his normal, confident manner, Igboeli has this warning for his future opponents: “Don’t worry about my size. Don’t worry about my speed. Don’t worry about nothing. Just know when he blows that whistle, it’s on. I’m a competitor, and I’m going to go in there and compete with you.”