Jayden Higgins hopes to join the list of big-target, big-production Cyclone wideouts

AMES – Iowa State football staffers edited together film of Allen Lazard, Hakeem Butler and Xavier Hutchinson, and they put it in front of Jayden Higgins.

Their message to the transfer from Eastern Kentucky?

Higgins, standing 6-foot-4 and possessing good speed, fits the mold that helped those guys become three of the best wide receivers in program history.

“I could see myself,” Higgins said of watching that film. “The plays that they made, I could see myself making the same type of plays.”

There’s still a long way to go before Higgins can be mentioned alongside any of those program legends, but the junior wideout has begun to emerge as quarterback Rocco Becht’s top target in an offense desperate to find and utilize weapons.

“I’m really encouraged about how he’s played and what he’s done in these first few weeks,” Iowa State offensive coordinator Nate Scheelhaase said. "You do feel like he’s got a really, really high ceiling, and he’s already made a ton of plays.

“We still feel like he’s just scratching the surface of who he can end up being.”

More: Iowa State football and Oklahoma State meet Saturday amid similar circumstances

Higgins has excelled even as Cyclone offense has sputtered

Higgins has 12 catches for 118 yards and two touchdowns through three games this season as a rare bright spot for a Cyclone offense that ranks among the nation’s least-productive. He’s accounted for Iowa State’s two touchdowns in the last two games.

“Starting to feel my role a little bit and make plays when they come to me,” Higgins said. “Really just doing whatever the team needs – making big plays on third down, blocking, making catches.”

Higgins caught Iowa State’s eye this past winter after a sophomore campaign at Eastern Kentucky that saw him make 58 catches for 757 yards and two touchdowns.

“You saw a big target,” Iowa State coach Matt Campbell said. “A guy that can go and really high-point the football. A guy that certainly has way better speed than maybe what we thought in the recruiting process. You saw a guy that reminds you a little bit of Hakeem.”

Campbell and his staff have a strong track record of reeling in older wide receivers who go on to be big difference-makers. They brought in La’Michael Pettway from Arkansas for one productive season, and then went to the junior college ranks to welcome in Hutchinson, who went on to have one of the best careers in Cyclone history.

“When you’re looking at evaluating those guys, you pretty much know what they’ve got the ability at their full potential to be,” Campbell said. “The other piece of it, when I talked about Pett, when I talked about X, you always talk about their character. How they came in here and went to work.

“We’ve been really fortunate to get a boost from guys that we’ve been able to get like that because their maturity and work ethic has resonated within the group.”

More: The 'best punter in the nation'? Tyler Perkins is making his case at Iowa State this season

Peterson: How did Iowa State roster get so young in Year 8 under coach Matt Campbell?.

Higgins wants to be great, puts in the work

Higgins’ similarity to those former greats in that regard made itself immediately clear once he got on campus this past winter.

“In the recruiting process with Jayden probably the thing I appreciated the most – you could tell he wanted to be great,” Campbell said. “January, February, March, it’s late at night and that guy is the guy that’s still in here working at his craft.

“That’s a little bit where experience and understanding what it takes to be successful and not just relying on God-given ability, those are some of the things that really stuck out to me.”

More: Iowa State football mailbag: Where do the Cyclones go from here after a loss to Ohio?

That mindset was again on display even after Higgins’ most unfortunate plays as a Cyclone – falling down on a route against Ohio that led to an easy Bobcat interception in one of the worst losses of Campbell’s Iowa State tenure.

“Nobody was more dejected on Saturday after the football game than Jayden was,” Campbell said. “To me, it tells you what a teammate he is, too, because there’s some great plays he makes in the football game but that guy owning it and feeling terrible – you slipped and it’s part of football. He came back and made some huge plays.

“He’s got great character. We’re really excited about what he can do for us.”

Travis Hines covers Iowa State University sports for the Des Moines Register and Ames Tribune. Contact him at thines@amestrib.com or  (515) 284-8000. Follow him on X at @TravisHines21.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Jayden Higgins is a rare bright spot for Iowa State's ailing offense