Marion’s Jaffer Murphy is a college football Bigfoot, with a 60-yard field goal to his credit

The longest college football field goal was 69 yards by Ove Johannson of Abilene Christian in 1976, when using tees was allowed.

If given a chance in one of his team’s final four games, Marion’s Jaffer Murphy could nab that record. Really.

Murphy has broken the school and Great Midwest Athletic Conference records for longest field goal three times this season for NCAA Division II Lake Erie College, in Painesville, Ohio. The most recent time was Oct. 12, when he nailed a 60-yarder against Kentucky Wesleyan.

Though a senior (with eligibility left after this season), this is Murphy’s first season of college football. So why not make field goals of 53, 55 and 60 yards?

Let’s start with the 60-yarder.

“I heard them say ‘All right, we’re going to kick it,’ So initially I thought they were going to punt it,” Murphy said. “But they said ‘kick it,’ so I ran out there.

“I honestly thought it was a 48-yard field goal. But then my holder, Daniel Jamieson, ‘Hey, Jaffer, lock in. This is a 60-yard field goal.’

“I was like ‘Oh, crap.’

“What’s crazy is there was wind blowing against me. So I had to almost try to miss the field goal, in order for the wind to pull it back around and go through. I was waiting to see what the result was, because we were pretty far back there. I've got a couple of guys on the O-line who are much taller than me. So I was honestly waiting to see if they put their arms up

“Once they did, I was like ‘Wow, that just happened.’”

Murphy and two brothers lived in Liberia when they were adopted by Maya and Sean Murphy of Marion in 2006. (Sean passed away two years ago.)

“Soccer is all I knew, from Africa” Murphy said, but it wasn’t as if he had never kicked long field goals that counted at Marion High. He made a 55-yarder and 48-yarder in the same game. He also started for the boys’ basketball team.

But soccer was his game. He scored 46 goals as a junior and was a two-time all-state player. He went to Drake University to continue playing soccer.

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“I got tired of cold weather in Iowa,” he said, “so I moved to Florida Gulf Coast University to play soccer. Then after my season there, I just hit a point where soccer for me didn’t feel the same. I didn't really feel that love and passion for it.”

“Jaffer just wasn’t hitting on all cylinders with soccer,” Maya Murphy said. “So he pivoted into thinking about entering the transfer portal for football.”

Getting college coaches’ attention was no small challenge. Murphy made it happen.

First, he put videos on Twitter of himself kicking field goals. He then connected with Jacob Enns of Tampa, who offers kicking and snapping instruction. Tampa is two hours north of Florida Gulf Coast, in Fort Myers.

“He drove four hours round-trip once or twice a week,” Enns said. “That first session, he was very green with his technique, just really a pure soccer guy with a ton of leg strength. By the end of the summer he had a field goal kicker’s swing and just looked much more natural.”

Murphy kicked up a storm at a Kohl’s Kicking showcase event. He also posted videos of himself making kicks of 70, even 72 yards.

“It was on a grass field,” Enns said. “People didn't believe that it was actually that far. So the next week, he came back and hit a 70-yarder on a lined turf field (with the distance marked off) to silence everyone who had any doubts about it.”

A Lake Erie coach contacted Murphy via Twitter. Murphy now is 11-of 13 in field goals. He missed a short one last Saturday. He said video proves the kick was good but it was very high, and the officials made a quick and incorrect call.

Murphy said he’s loving his Lake Erie experience, but “I am also looking for opportunities at the next level.”

“There are lots of schools in the country that wish they had a kicker like him right now, that's for sure,” Enns said.

Said Murphy: “If you had asked me last November, no, I didn't believe this would be possible. I didn't have any faith or trust in it. But faith plays a big part of my life. So when I did make that switch, quitting soccer was easy.

“I feel like God is still going to produce even more, bigger and greater things within my life and my football career.”

Comments: (319) 398-8440; mike.hlas@thegazette.com