Three games into his return from a right ACL injury that cost him all of last season, Kiahn Martinez chucked his crutch.
“I wore my brace the first two weeks, but the third week, I said to myself, ‘You got to let it go,’” Martinez said. “First carry of that game against Central Missouri, I see a crease, and I hit it for a 15-yard run. My first thought was, ‘Oh yeah, I’m back.’ And then one of the last drives of the fourth quarter, I had the game-winning touchdown.
“That’s when I knew I was in (for a big season).”
A Regis Jesuit alum, Martinez is one of several Front Range headliners on a CSU Pueblo team that won its second straight Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference title this season. The ThunderWolves now enter the Division II playoffs as a No. 3 seed on Saturday, hosting UT Permian Basin in the first round at the ThunderBowl.
The redshirt senior Martinez leads CSU Pueblo with 565 rushing yards and is tied for second on the team with six touchdowns. Wideout Marcellus Honeycutt Jr., a George Washington alum, is the No. 2 target for QB Roman Fuller. The sophomore deep threat has 28 catches for 552 yards, good for 19.7 yards per catch, plus six TDs.
And on the defensive side of the ball, the team’s leading tackler is linebacker Bryson Torrie, who played at Vista PEAK Prep. The junior has 71 tackles (32 solo), plus three defensive TDs.
Honeycutt says Martinez has provided crucial leadership, especially as CSU Pueblo stretched its RMAC win streak to 25 games this year, the longest active conference win streak in Division II.
“Anytime we might not be having a good practice or guys are slacking off, Kiahn’s not afraid to speak his mind about it,” Honeycutt said. “If you’re not living up to the program standard, he’s going to call you on it. That’s a big reason we’re in the position we are now.”
The ThunderWolves’ second straight undefeated conference slate didn’t come without plenty of drama for the Cardiac Pack. CSU Pueblo trailed at the half in its final three games of the regular season against Western Colorado, Mines and Chadron State, the first two of those on the road.
Against Western Colorado, the ThunderWolves trailed 21-0 midway through the third quarter. But Colorado players carried the Pack to a stunning comeback. Torrie (seven tackles) and the defense stiffened up, Martinez had two short TD runs, Honeycutt hauled in an 88-yard TD pass, and then Jackson Smith (Arapahoe alum) drilled the game-winning 32-yard field goal at the buzzer.
Then, against Mines, after the Pack found themselves down 31-13 early in the third quarter, Honeycutt’s 32-yard TD reception with under a minute to play in regulation forced OT en route to the win. It was similar drama against Chadron State — a double-OT victory in which CSU Pueblo erased an early 14-3 deficit and Honeycutt reeled in a walk-off 19-yard TD catch.
“We preach having a zero-zero mentality every day and every play, and that showed in those last three games,” said Honeycutt, who is in his first year with the ThunderWolves after transferring from Eastern Washington.
“We’re really good at staying in the moment, controlling what we can control, keeping a level head. We know we need to start faster in the playoffs, but we also know we’re never out of a game if we get down.”
Saturday marks the 19th NCAA playoff game for CSU Pueblo, the 2014 national champions. The Pack are led by third-year coach Philip Vigil, an Arvada native and Faith Christian alum. Should the ThunderWolves beat UT Permian Basin, a rematch against Western Colorado might await in the second round. The Mountaineers play at Central Washington on Saturday.
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