When Donovan Jones was a freshman at Omaha North in 2020, he didn’t look like a football player.

Standing around 5-foot-8 and just 140 pounds, power conference football seemed like a pipe dream at the time. Good thing judgements aren’t made that early in a kid’s career.

“Like I’ve told a lot of people: his upside is huge,” Omaha North head coach Larry Martin told Inside Nebraska of Jones.

Jones was one of 12 recruits who verbally committed to Nebraska last June. He signed his letter of intent on the first day of the early signing period and will get to Lincoln in the summer after he ends his high school career on the basketball court and track.

Sending his NLI to Lincoln to officially become a Cornhusker was something Jones had been waiting to do for a long time. After he verbally committed six months ago, Jones said he felt a change the next time he was on a football field.

“Football-wise, the game got slower once I committed because you don’t have to worry about anything else,” Jones said. “You’re just more comfortable out there. Everything else has been straight. It’s been normal.”

With the weight of his college decision off his shoulders and mind, Jones played free and fast last fall. Jones, now 6-1 and 190 pounds, enjoyed a stellar senior campaign, earning a first-team All-Nebraska honor after a season in which he racked up 57 tackles, five tackles for loss, four interceptions — one of which was a pick-six — three pass breakups and a blocked punt.

“I hate to label kids a late-maturer, but I still think he’s going to continue to grow and get bigger,” Martin said. “We’ve just watched him grow, and he’s taken off. Because of his hard work in the weight room, he’s defined his body. He has a commitment to speed and agility.”

The transition from a 125-pound freshman to a Big Ten recruit as a senior wasn’t easy. The process involved time, plenty of work and determination. But family was always the driving force behind Jones’ goal of playing big-time college football.

Jones’ father, Deondre, played corner at the FCS level at South Dakota from 1994-97 and then safety for three seasons with the Omaha Beef. Donovan wanted to make his dad proud by earning the opportunity to play at the highest college level.

“I just want to represent for my family,” Donovan said. “It’s mainly about my family, being the first one to do something great.”

After coming to Omaha North from Fremont Bergan in 2000, Martin was looking for a DBs coach. It just so happened to be Deondre’s first year teaching at North, so Martin was able to land a former college football DB to teach the position to the high school kids. It was a good match — Deondre wound up coaching under Martin for the next 11 seasons.

But that also meant Donovan was involved in the Vikings’ football program, too. Whether he was the water boy or ball boy, Donovan was right there on the sideline, watching the sport he began to love.

Deondre never wanted to be one of those parents who pushes a sport onto their children. There were of course lessons being taught at home, but Deondre, who’s been the athletic director at Omaha Benson during Donovan’s prep career, didn’t want to be another coach on top of the ones he already had at Omaha North.

“Of course I’ve always coached him, but I wanted him to learn different things and hear different coaches' voices,” Deondre said. “So I tried my hardest to not be his coach so I could be his dad.”

Deondre also didn’t want to push Donovan toward football just because he played it. But sometimes, it just works out. Donovan gravitated toward football. He fell in love with it.

“We had to take him out of flag football because he was a tad too aggressive,” Deondre said with a laugh. “To see the growth, to see the mindset, I honestly figured if I could just give him some tools, fill in the gaps that I didn’t have, this might come to fruition.”

Donovan played the dollar position, or strong safety, in Omaha North’s defense. Often creeping down into the tackle box before the snap, Jones is a sure tackler who can provide run support while also being quick enough on his feet to hold his own in pass coverage.

“Obviously he was very good at coming downhill and tackling in space,” Martin said, “but I really saw growth at becoming more comfortable in route reading and tracking the ball when it’s in the air and things like that.”

As a verbal commit, Donovan was a staple at every Husker home game last fall. The coaching staff has done a good job of staying in touch with him, too. He mentioned defensive coordinator Tony White and defensive line coach Terrance Knighton have visited him at school often, and he texts regularly with his future position coach, Evan Cooper.

“Coach Coop, he’s a great coach. He’s really serious, and that’s good. But he’s also chill. He just broke it down for me, like, ‘Once you get here, it’s go time,’” Donovan said.

Deondre, who’s seen his share of DB coaches, is a fan of Cooper. It’s hard not to be once you get the opportunity to see him on a field working with his guys.

“The first thing I noticed about him was at a spring practice — his intensity and attention to detail truly separates him from a lot of DB coaches that I’ve been around,” Deondre said. “He knows exactly what he wants out of his individuals. His players know what his expectation is. I think it works well for him.”

Donovan is one of many young DBs in the program. While he projects as a safety, there will always be the possibility that he grows and develops into the hybrid rover spot in Nebraska’s 3-3-5 defense, and maybe even linebacker when it’s all said and done.

“I’m really excited to get down there and see what they do with me,” Donovan said. “They have three safeties back there. So I’m going to see which one they put me at and play the hardest I can. I loved watching their DBs and how they were really physical. It was good to watch.”

For now, Donovan is focused on his basketball season. And after that, track, where he’ll run the 100- and 200-meter dashes while also being a member of the 4x100 team. One of Donovan’s goals is to reach a 10.7-second 100 time. He has a previous best of 11.06.

And it’s Donovan’s speed and burst that caught Husker coaches’ attention back in June during a camp inside Memorial Stadium. Jones was in the 4.4-second range for the 40-yard dash. Former Wyoming head coach Craig Bohl was in attendance at the camp and offered Jones right there on Tom Osborne Field. Nebraska followed up the next day with an offer.

“He ran two of them,” Deondre said of Donovan’s camp 40s. “After the first one, they had him run it again because they couldn’t believe he was moving like that.”

Deondre remembers leaving the Lindenwood mega camp last summer and seeing several coaches pulling Donovan off to the side to chat. Coaches from Arkansas and Illinois asked the family to come down to Fayetteville and Champaign for a camp.

“Once the body caught up with the mind, it just kind of all clicked at the same time,” Deondre said.

What the Husker coaches liked, according to Martin, is that Jones kept improving at Omaha North. After a breakout junior season where he recorded 41 tackles and two interceptions, he added to his résumé as a senior in a big way.

“He has a lot of athletic ability. He obviously had a great year for us, but he’s going to continue to grow into a phenomenal player,” Martin said. “I think the growth we all saw from his sophomore to junior year, then his junior to senior year, was really good. And with all the resources and his hard work that he’s willing to put in, he’s going to blossom in that defensive scheme they have down there, I really believe that.”

The current version of Donovan Jones is far from the 140-pound version that walked into Larry Martin's classroom as a freshman wanting to play football. After a season or two under strength coach Corey Campbell and nutritionist Kristin Coggin, who knows what Jones will grow and develop into.

That should excite Husker coaches and fans everywhere.