ONLINE EXTRA: Jones brings brain, brawn to game vs. UCLA
By Daily Bruin Staff
Nov. 29, 2001 9:00 p.m.
 Arizona State Sports Information Offensive lineman
Levi Jones is one of the major road blocks
preventing UCLA from a potential bowl game invite.
By Scott Bair
Daily Bruin Reporter
Levi Jones, like the other 89 members of the varsity football
team, received a scholarship to attend Arizona State University.
The difference between Jones and the other 89 is that he came to
ASU on an academic scholarship, not an athletic one.
Jones was a four-sport star from the small town of Eloi, Ariz.,
who concentrated more on As and Bs than the Xs and Os. That’s
the only way that his mother, Joyce, would have it.
She viewed Jones’ athletic ventures as a distraction from
the main goal of getting a college degree. She pushed him to
succeed in the classroom and to do well in school, so he thanked
his mother for her efforts by getting a free ride to ASU.
Just before the move from Eloi to Tempe, ex-ASU and current UCLA
defensive coordinator Phil Snow entered the picture. He came to
Eloi to recruit one of Jones’ Santa Cruz High School
teammates and stumbled upon Jones and his versatile talents. While
in Eloi, Snow began scratching a competitive itch that Jones just
couldn’t get rid of.
After flirting with the idea of playing basketball, Jones walked
on to the Sun Devil squad during his freshman year. Jones made an
instant impact during his redshirt season, and was upgraded to
varsity and was awarded an athletic scholarship in exchange for his
academic award.
College football wasn’t in his mother’s master plan,
but Jones couldn’t shake the need to compete.
“My mom always wanted me to succeed in academics,”
Jones said. “She’s always said that graduating from
college was my first priority. Now she sees football more as an
added bonus.”
Jones’ talent made football into not only an added bonus,
but also a prospective job opportunity. NFL teams will have a tough
time passing on Jones, ASU’s 6-foot-6, 332-pound first-team
All Pac-10 left tackle.
Opposing defensive linemen have also had a tough time getting
past Jones this season. He will make it hard for UCLA defensive end
Dave Ball, his foe during Saturday’s contest at the Rose
Bowl, to attack ASU quarterback Jeff Krohn’s blind side.
“Levi is awesome to say the least,” Ball said.
“He’s a big, physical guy. He’ll throw you down
in more ways than one. Once you’re down, he knows how to keep
you there.”
While devoting so much of his time to keeping opposing linemen
down, Jones has managed to keep his grades up. Though the NFL draft
could offer him a job in April, Jones has made sure to get the
college degree his mother always wanted before that time comes. On
Dec. 14, Jones will walk through ASU’s commencement ceremony
and leave with a degree in exercise science and minors in both
business and sociology.
“A college degree has always been important to both Levi
and his family,” Snow said. “He has a lot of business
to take care with football and school, and he has always taken care
of both.”
Now that his graduation day has been established and draft day
has been set, Jones only has one more thing left to do in his
college career ““ to play the Bruins on Saturday.
