On Saturday night, during a 41-23 win over Colorado State, Martin reminded most everyone why he was worthy of last season’s award while providing ample evidence that he may be on his way to reaching new heights.

The senior ball-carrier galloped around, over and through the Ram defense on Saturday at Canvas Stadium in Fort Collins to the tune of 176 yards and three touchdowns on just 15 carries. Stellar numbers for any player throughout the course of a 60-minute game, but when considering Martin did almost all of his work during the game’s first 30 minutes, the work becomes all the more impressive.

“LJ’s one of the best running backs in the country,” assessed BYU coach Kalani Sitake. “He could be sitting right now playing in the NFL, and he decided to come back for a reason. So, we’re thankful that he came back. He put in a lot of hard work in the off-season, and it’s paying off.”

Paying off indeed, and it didn’t take long on Saturday for Martin to provide the receipts.

On just the second play from scrimmage, Martin took a handoff, and showed just about every facet that makes him the superior runner he’s become. The 6-foot-2, 220 pounder showed patience in waiting for his blocks to develop, then showcased his strength to get by a couple of would-be tacklers, and then enough speed to finish it off for a 56-yard run into the endzone.

“It was a lot of fun, you know?,” the almost always understated Martin said after the game with a big smile. “Just going out there and running the ball … yeah, it was just a lot of fun.”

Martin wasn’t close to being finished, however.

He followed up his initial touchdown run with scoring runs from two and eight yards out, respectively, and scored all three during the first quarter of play to give the Cougars a 21-7 lead entering the second quarter. And all of it was very much part of the pregame design, with Cougar coaches knowing they could ride the strength of Martin and his blockers throughout versus a somewhat susceptible Ram defensive front.

“We knew they would blitz a lot, so we knew that there was going to be opportunities for big runs, and I feel like we did that,” Martin said. “And then also we knew that they were going to try to play the safeties down at some point, and we were able to take them over the top. So, yeah, I think we did real well.”

The biggest over-the-top play was provided by Cougar freshman receiver Legend Glasker who joined Martin at the podium during postgame interviews. As Colorado State started crowding the line just following Martin’s initial touchdown run, Glasker broke free behind the second and hauled in a 7o-yard bomb from quarterback Bear Bachmeier with one hand and seemingly with ease. Just one play later saw Martin score his second touchown run of the game.

“I haven’t seen it yet, and I didn’t even know I caught it one-handed,” Glasker said. “(The defender) was trying to grab my arm, so I tried to get separation and, literally, it just fell right in my arm. It was a good ball.”

Glasker finished the game with five receptions for 131 yards and three rushes for 21 yards, which included a 5-yard touchdown run near the end of the second half that gave BYU a 31-7 lead at the break.

“Just seeing all my brothers out there just really got me amped up, and LJ just having such a great game made me want to go out there and make plays,” Glasker said. “It felt good to shut the crowd up every time we had a big play, and just seeing the crowd just walk away and just leave the stands, and then seeing all the BYU fans just sitting there. It was cool to see all that.”

And Glasker wasn’t wrong by any means. While Cougar fans showed up in droves, a boisterous Colorado State fanbase showed enthusiastic at the start of the game before the majority left the stadium at the break with those same Cougar fans becoming the majority base for the game’s final 30 minutes.

One big fact that dampened Colorado State’s prospects considerably, while proving deflating to the Ram faithful was when prolific quarterback Hauss Hejny left the game with injury late in the first quarter and didn’t return. Backing up Hejny was K’saan Farrar, who managed just 70 yards through the air on 13-23 passing and couldn’t provide the punch that Hejny has shown so far this season and throughout the first quarter of play during Saturday’s game.

While just about everything went right for the Cougars during the first half of play, things bogged down considerably during the second. With Sitake opting to sit most of his starters during most of the game’s final 30 minutes, the execution level on both sides of the ball took a hit, leading to a lot of penalties and other miscues.

“We just got to be better as a team … and they are some guys that are that are backups, but those guys are one play away from getting in the game. So they need to be ready for it,” Sitake said. “I did like the fight in all of them … it got a little sloppy, but we’ll be fine. This is this is stuff that we can easily fix.”

One thing that doesn’t need a lot of fixing is, of course, Martin, who proved yet again to be a load on just about every occasion, allowing him ample opportunity to sit for almost the entire second half of play, which could provide plenty of dividends for the remainder of the season.

“I’m just really proud of the way that he plays the game, and proud of the other 10 guys on the field that that allowed him to run the ball,” Sitake concluded. “And hey, he can catch the ball out of the backfield, he can protect, and he can block. So, just I think he’s a complete back, and you know, we’re thankful that he was able to get us a quick start that we needed.”