The scene was something out of a nightmare, the kind that occasionally visits any player, coach, parent or fan involved with the game of football.

For several minutes in the fourth quarter of Colorado’s overtime victory Oct. 15 against Cal, Deion Smith laid on the turf at Folsom Field, with a team of trainers closely tending to him as everything else in a stadium filled with more than 50,000 people fell silent and came to a halt. As Smith was carried off the field on a stretcher, there was hope for the best, but also fear for the worst.

Two weeks after that, Smith addressed those anxieties with a resounding answer few could have foreseen.

On the same field where his health and immediate future seemed in serious doubt 14 days earlier, Smith produced the best game of his career. Though it came in a losing effort, a 42-34 setback against Arizona State, Smith rushed for a career-high 111 yards and a touchdown, providing his team with a steady and consistent rushing attack on a day in which it recorded its highest single-game point total of the season.

It was, as Smith saw it, an unveiling for a new and better version of himself.

“It doesn't make me fearful or timid or anything,” he said Wednesday. “If anything, it pushes me to be more physical from my side. It didn't really frighten me or anything. If anything, I feel like it changed my perspective. It did it in a positive way, as if it was like I needed to turn it up.”

Indeed, Smith said after last Saturday’s game and reiterated earlier this week that the experience changed his perspective. Instead of getting pushed away from the game, his injury scare made him embrace the sport that much more. Even being sidelined for a week showed him how much he missed being on the field and with his teammates.

Those feelings were translated into a new, more aggressive mindset whenever he gets the ball. Smith said his injury scare made him want to be that much more physical on the field. While counterintuitive at first glance, it makes some sense, as football players will often say one of the easiest ways to get hurt on the field is to be hesitant or timid.

“He was running harder in practice than he was before the injury,” Colorado interim head coach Mike Sanford said. “I think he ran his hardest as he probably has in his entire career. He ran physically. He looked fast. He made plays. He was communicating. It just says so much about how much he loves his game and just how much he loves his teammates. That’s what I think we're seeing right now – a whole bunch of fight for the brotherhood that exists on that team.”

It wasn’t necessarily passiveness that led Smith to suffering a head and neck injury. It occurred on a dump off from quarterback J.T. Shrout near midfield. Shortly after catching it and turning his attention up field, Cal’s Collin Gamble lowered his head and popped the ball out of Smith’s control. Shortly after the collision, Smith’s body appeared to go limp as he fell to the turf and laid there motionless while holding at his right hamstring. It wasn’t anything far out of the ordinary – it was a violent play in a violent game.

Given the nature of the injury, Smith only remembers so much about what followed. More than anything, he recalls the biggest struggle being regaining his breath. He was taken inside the Champions Center, where he underwent x-rays and concussion tests. In the days after, he dealt with concussion symptoms and was advised to relax. He took that time to get back to the slew of people who had reached out to check on him.

After missing the entirety of the week leading up to a loss to Oregon State, as well as the game itself, Smith returned to practice the next week, first taking part in a non-contact practice and then in full pads the next day. To the surprise of those around him, he showed no signs of what he had been dealing with much of the previous two weeks.

“It’s rare,” running backs coach Darian Hagan said. “A lot of guys when they get back from an injury like that – especially when they hurt their neck – they’re not running the same because they’re thinking more about ‘If I drop my head, I can get hurt.’ All types of things you start thinking about because you hurt your neck. But not one time did he ever seem cautious. He just went out there and played football. That’s a testament to him and how he loves the game of football. I know I would have been out there timid.”

Soon enough, what was exhibited on the practice field was shown in a game. Smith broke free early, taking his first handoff 11 yards before running out of bounds. In the second quarter, he reeled off a 25-yard gain. In the fourth quarter, he dove over the line for a one-yard touchdown to trim his team’s deficit to two possessions. On his way to those 111 yards, he averaged a respectable 4.6 yards per carry. Given what he was returning from, the carry workload alone was notable.

It was perhaps the best outing for Smith in what is developing into a strong junior season. The Houston native leads all Buffs players in rushing yards with 354, more than double that of the next-closest player. His 5.1 yards per carry are a team-high among players with at least three carries. In what has been a relatively overachieving running backs room, which has gone much of the season without senior Alex Fontenot, Smith has emerged as Colorado’s best option.

“I’ve seen that dude grow up right before my eyes,” Hagan said. “When he first started, he was playing fast and playing with confidence, but he was also making a lot of simple mistakes that had to get corrected. There came a time when other guys were playing in front of him, but he never put his head down. He was constantly battling. By doing the little things we wanted him to do, he has shown that with maturity and doing the necessary things that you can be a special type of player.”

After rushing for 192 yards and averaging 3.6 yards per carry last season after missing all of the 2020 season with a knee injury, Smith has displayed significant growth.

Sometimes, as was the case last week, that progress can show itself in unexpected moments.

“I feel like I trust myself a lot more,” Smith said. “I play to my instincts. I feel like with TCU and early on, I was thinking a lot about my reads and things that I would do, but now I just kind of do it instinctively. I don't really second-guess myself. If I make a decision, then I try to do it full speed…It's just taking pride in that and just trying to have fun and doing it without overthinking. The biggest thing for me is just to get out of my own head.”