Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

UNLV receiver a rising star looking for the fade

Phillip Payne felt at home with the Rebels long before touchdowns put him in the spotlight

Payne

Leila Navidi

UNLV’s Phillip Payne - a Western High grad - made a one-handed touchdown catch in last Saturday’s game at Arizona State. It tied the game with 18 seconds to play, and UNLV ultimately defeated the then-No. 15 Sun Devils in overtime, 23-20.

No Payne, No Gain

As a true freshman Phillip Payne has 4 touchdown catches in 3 games. Watch Payne and coaches talk about his early season performance.

Click to enlarge photo

UNLV receiver Phillip Payne (18) makes a one-handed catch for a touchdown against Arizona State defensive back Pierre Singfield late in the fourth quarter on Sept. 13, 2008. The Rebels won the contest, 23-20, in overtime.

Next game

  • Opponent: Iowa State
  • Date: Sept. 20, 6 p.m.
  • Where: Sam Boyd Stadium
  • Where: Las Vegas

Call it the most memorable freshman mistake in UNLV football history.

The catch -- you know, the one-handed, falling backward, somehow-staying-in-bounds catch -- made by Phillip Payne that tied things up Saturday in Tempe, Ariz., with 18 seconds left in regulation may not have even happened if everything had gone by the book.

Of course, by now, just about everyone knows what all went down. Sparked by a furious fourth-quarter comeback and an unlikely blocked kick, the Rebels ousted then-No. 15 Arizona State and made waves throughout the college football landscape.

What you might not know is that the play that could be labeled the crown jewel of that come-from-behind effort pretty much happened by accident.

"A lot of people don't know that, and I wasn't going to tell anybody," quarterback Omar Clayton joked. "He just lined up in the wrong spot. I'm not worried about it. It worked. Who knows what would have happened if he did line up in the right spot?"

Payne elaborated: "I still think about how I was in the wrong position, wrong play. I got talked to about it a lot during film. Even though I made a play or whatever, it was still the fact that I was in the wrong place. I know now."

But the fact is, in the end, it really didn't matter.

Within an hour of the play, Payne was gracing SportsCenter's Top 10 plays of the day, recreating the moment for a decent-sized collection of media and trying to respond to the 15 missed calls and 30 text messages waiting for him on his phone.

It was his introduction to the rest of the college football world, in a way. But it had hardly been a secret within the UNLV program that Payne -- a “local boy makes good” story -- is no average freshman.

The 'pencil neck' playmaker

When Payne showed up to play varsity ball as a sophomore at Western High, on appearance alone, it was hard not to poke fun -- even for his coaches.

"His nickname was 'pencil neck' all through his high school career ... 'pencil neck Payne,'" former Western coach Brian Murray said.

But, even from Day One, the kid was no joke.

"Even as a sophomore on the varsity level, he led our team in touchdown catches and yards per catch," Murray continued. "He was a legitimate receiving threat right out of the gate, especially with his ability to jump up and fight for balls. That was just very, very uncommon to see a kid do that at such a young age."

Payne wound up leading Western in receptions, yards and touchdowns in each of his three seasons, finishing his run at Western with 81 catches for 1,758 yards and 28 scores. Payne credited his high-ball ability early in his career as a receiver to rebounding skills learned playing basketball. Whatever it was, college coaches began taking notice. Slowly.

"The thing that some coaches were a little concerned with was his speed," Murray said. "I told them the kid's not a burner, but he's adequate, and there's a lot of kids who have speed, but don't have his skills. Some people weren't willing to take a shot on a kid who doesn't run a 4.4 or 4.5 (40-yard dash). A lot of them missed the boat."

UNLV, obviously, was one of those schools that didn't disregard him because of questions surrounding his speed (though he now runs the 40 in the 4.6 range).

"He's probably a little bit faster than people think because he is really smooth," said UNLV receivers coach Kris Cinkovich, a former Las Vegas High head coach who began recruiting Payne for the Rebels. "People worry about the stopwatch a lot, and the game still comes down to the ability to make plays."

The UNLV coaching staff had little hesitation about recruiting him. Cinkovich & Co. were impressed with Payne's junior year highlight reel, especially his knack for playing physical on the perimeter, showing a willingness to block and get his uniform dirty.

Payne earned an invite to the Rebels' summer camp after his junior year, and there, he showed more of the same, which was all Mike Sanford needed to see before making Payne an offer.

But Payne wasn't signed and sealed right away. It took a little while, actually.

See, football wasn't all he was taking into consideration.

Choosing for the right reasons

At home, Joel Payne wasn't getting any better. A Vietnam veteran, Phillip's father and biggest fan was suffering.

"For awhile, during my middle school years, he was cool, but I don't know if he was hiding it from us or whatever," Phillip said. "When I was a little kid, we used to race to the car at Albertson's and things like that. Over time it got worse and worse and I finally realized when I got to about ninth, 10th grade, he had cancer. From there, it just progressed down. It was prostate cancer, and it spread."

One thing Joel never hid was the joy he took in watching Phillip play football. He was in the stands from start to finish at every game, even if his son's team was up by so much that he was doing nothing more than watching from the bench. He'd always be waiting for Phillip afterward with a big hug and a deep “Yeeeeeah, allllriiiiight” -- something Phillip says he still can hear his father saying after every game he plays.

Phillip even recalls one time following a double-overtime thriller as a Western sophomore, when after catching the game-winning score, Joel made his way onto the field to celebrate with his son.

"We used to have campus police and everything," he said with a smile. "I didn't even think he could still hop fences."

But last year, at age 56, Joel had a feeling he wouldn't be able to see much of his son's college career, and he wanted Phillip to know it, now that he was old enough to understand.

"He didn't want me to make a decision based off of him. I guess in a way he knew he wasn't going to be here after awhile or so," Payne said. "I still remember the whole conversation that night, how he knew my mom could take care of my little brother. I still have aunts, uncles and other relatives that could still take care of them."

In other words, Joel didn't want his son to feel pressure to stay close to home. He wanted him to weigh all of his offers -- from the likes of UNR, Utah, Arizona and Oregon State -- equally.

But that fact was hard for Phillip to ignore.

"It was in my head. I think I did (decide) a little bit based on him, but at that time and moment, I believed this would be the best spot for me," Phillip said. "I felt that UNLV showed me the most love, coach-wise."

Joel passed away almost two months to the day after Phillip signed his letter of intent with the Rebels. Phillip continued to feel love within the program from the day he arrived, keeping photos of his father in his wallet as he began the next chapter of his life just a few miles from home.

"As soon as I came in, Casey (Flair) was a big mentor to me. They brought me into the family," Payne recalled. "(The receivers) had a board of goals, and one of the goals was to bring new receivers in and teach them the ropes. Workouts were hard, but they kept pushing me through it.

"If I was just at home chillin', and not getting any help, I would have still come in lazy. I probably wouldn't admit it to a lot of people, but in high school I was lazy. They came in and just took me in."

The start of something special

It wasn't until the Rebels made their annual two-week trip to Ely -- escaping both the heat and distractions of Las Vegas to focus on preparation for the season -- that Payne's knack for red zone consistency became apparent to the rest of his teammates.

"Our players had a player-run seven-on-seven at night (during the summer), and we kept hearing from our players, 'Man, that freshman is really good,'" Sanford said. "They didn't even know his name. You take that over into training camp, and that's when you saw a lot of Omar going to him on fades."

At the end of almost every practice in Ely, the Rebels would go full contact for 11-on-11 red zone drills. After a couple of days, the defense knew exactly what was coming at least a few times -- fade to Phillip.

Didn't matter. He caught all of them. Even the ones floating out of bounds, he'd still make it a point to snatch them up. It frustrated defensive backs to no end. One day after practice, freshman corner Will Chandler even stuck around for a slew of extra reps in defending the fade, trying to find some solution for stopping the new guy.

While the Rebel defenders pulled their hair out over it, the coaches could do nothing but smile.

"Obviously that makes us better in a lot of ways," Sanford said. "First off, a guy that just makes plays makes you better, but you can't just defend the other two guys. You've got to defend him. It helps our run game and it helps Omar, too."

Testified Clayton: "Phillip has a tendency to do exactly what he's supposed to do in the red zone. We don't have any incompletions to Phillip in the red zone. I'm just thankful for it. You always need that receiver who's just about a sure thing, especially in the red zone."

Very thankful, indeed. Four of Clayton's six touchdown passes this season have gone to Payne, who is three-for-three on fade attempts in the red zone. None was more impressive than his first score against Arizona State, in which the Sun Devils obviously had sniffed out what the Rebels were up to. With that said, they threw sophomore cornerback Omar Bolden -- arguably the top cover corner in the Pac-10 -- out on an island to the right with Payne.

Given how aggressive Bolden is known for playing, Clayton made an adjustment and threw it to Payne's outside shoulder as opposed to up high. But the result was the same as always.

"That was our bread and butter," Murray said of when he had Payne at Western. "I text messaged coach Cink after the game: 'It's good to see Fade to Phil still works in college.'"

The Rebels, though, don't expect teams to sleep on Payne from here on out. His 12 catches for 143 yards and four touchdowns so far have him as an early frontrunner for the Mountain West Conference's Newcomer of the Year award, and he'll be a focal point of most opposing scouting reports. Last year, the Rebels scored a touchdown on 41 percent of their trips into the red zone (15 of 37). So far in 2008, they're seven of 10, with Payne being responsible for four of them.

The secret's out, but that doesn't mean his red-zone presence will be rendered ineffective.

"What's going to happen, we think, is it's going to take guys out of the box to get a double-team on him," Cinkovich said. "And that should in that case help our run game."

It's not a bad early impact for a guy who figured he'd probably redshirt this year, being that he came into the program with just 185 pounds on a 6-foot-4 frame.

His bursting onto the scene also helps the program on the recruiting front. Cinkovich said each recruit he contacted this week over the phone -- be it from Southern Nevada, Washington, Oregon or California -- mentioned Payne's highlight-reel grab from Saturday.

While UNLV can use his success as a recruiting tool, coaches and teammates say what's made Payne's presence special is that he hasn't let it go to his head. Even following Tuesday's practice, just three days removed from it, he hung around the practice fields at Rebel Park to do some extra skill and conditioning work with Cinkovich.

And no matter how many SportsCenter Top 10s he appears in, no matter how many touchdowns he catches, the UNLV staff doesn't expect that to change.

"He was raised well. He's a real grounded kid," Cinkovich said. "I think he'll respond well to the success he's had, and it should only make him want to have more."

Join the Discussion:

Check this out for a full explanation of our conversion to the LiveFyre commenting system and instructions on how to sign up for an account.

Full comments policy