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On a late-June morning, Oregon Ducks junior wide receiver Devon Allen practices his starts in the 110-meter hurdles at Hayward Field. In two weeks, on July 9, he will take his mark on the same starting line when Oregon hosts the U.S. Olympic track and field trials. On that day, to become one of the few active college football players ever to make an Olympic team, he'll have to beat some serious competition in Aries Merritt and Jason Richardson, the 2012 gold and silver medalists. "You can't be starstruck when you run against them," Allen says. "Hopefully they're worried about me too." If he makes the team, Allen will face a tough decision: Play with the Ducks or go pro in track post-Rio. But Allen isn't one to get ahead of himself, and The Mag is there as he approaches his first hurdle: earning a ticket to Brazil.
Double team
His football teammates say he's a track star who plays football, but Allen insists he's a two-sport athlete who isn't ready to sacrifice one for the other. After winning his first U.S. outdoor title in the 110-meter hurdles in 2014, Allen led Ducks receivers with seven TD catches as a redshirt freshman before tearing his ACL at the 2015 Rose Bowl. "It took me 12 months to feel 100 percent and confident again," Allen says, crediting his football training with helping his track. "We train for explosiveness and strength, and that plays into hurdling."
With the trials only two weeks away, Allen refuses to allow fear of injury to keep him off the gridiron. "You can get hurt doing anything. These guys come to my track meets, and I like to be around the team." Besides, he adds, "after the injury, I got faster."
Running home
Over the past two weeks, Hayward's green-and-yellow decor has given way to red, white and blue. "I practice here every day," Allen says. "It's a definite advantage." At the July 9 final, the crowd offers Allen deafening support during his strong start; with three hurdles to go, he is even with the other leaders. "That's when I knew," he says. "My last hurdles are really strong."
As he crosses the line in a personal-best 13.03, Allen realizes he has booked his trip to Rio de Janeiro, where he will be favored to medal on Aug. 15. He bolts toward the crowd and leaps into the stands, where Ducks right guard Cameron Hunt hugs him and points him toward his family, uniformed in "Team Allen" T-shirts. Afterward, Allen says it all feels surreal. "I knew I could run that time. I knew it was in there. [But] it still hasn't set in."