Texas A&M Football: Is Devon Achane the fastest player in CFB?

The Texas A&M football team hasn’t had the most explosive offense as a whole this season. Averaging just 383.8 yards per game, the Aggies are in the lower half of college football in terms of offensive production.

That said, the very same Texas A&M football team that was struggling to score the ball a few weeks ago has exploded onto the scene in the past couple of weeks. In two consecutive games, A&M has scored at least 35 points.

And a key contributor in these improved performances is a player who could be considered the most explosive back in college football.

Texas A&M football backup RB Devon Achane might be the fastest player in college football

If you’re not familiar with Devon Achane — get familiar. Even behind Isaiah Spiller, he’s been extremely productive for Jimbo Fisher. When Spiller is gone, Achane will become the primary back on this team and likely be one of the best runningbacks in college football.

For now, he’s the second option in one of the most talented backfields in college football.

Most recently, you may remember Achane for his two touchdown runs in a win against Missouri. Those two runs highlighted a 100+ yard performance from Achane where he and his counterpart in Spiller both looked like All-Americans.

That said, Achane put his name on the map last weekend when he returned a kickoff 96 yards to the house against Alabama following a Tide score. According to Recruiting Analytics, Achane reached a top speed of 22.2 miles per hour on the return. That’s really fast.

But this isn’t even the tip of the iceberg.

Achane has been making huge plays when he gets into open space all season long. He had a 63-yard touchdown run in the Aggies’ season opener against Kent State and a 41-yarder against Mississippi State. Through the air, Achane has caught five passes for 25 yards or more.

The fact of the matter is simple — if it turns into a footrace, there isn’t a single player in college football who can keep up with the Texas A&M runningback. It’s not just sheer athleticism, either — Achane is on the Texas A&M Track & Field team as well, where he’s one of the fastest sprinters in the country.

The Aggie runningback won SEC Freshman of the Week honors twice last year. I’ll be honest when I say that I know almost nothing about track and field. I won’t try to act like I can give you an expert analysis here, but if you’re interested, you can check out his bio on 12thman.com.

This speed translates to the stat sheet too, where Achane averages 6.6 yards per carry, largely due to breakaway runs that we’ve become accustomed to seeing.

To make a long story short, he’s really fast, even against trained sprinters. What happens when you put a sprinter against guys who aren’t trained to run? Magic, which is exactly what we’ve seen out of Achane thus far in College Station.