Chip Trayanum Twitter Photo
Vince Marrow’s Ohio connections have paid off again for Kentucky.
Former Arizona State/Ohio State running back Chip Trayanum announced Tuesday he was transferring to Kentucky as the Cats hope to add another productive transfer running back like they did last season with Ray Davis, who ran for 1,066 yards and 13 touchdowns and made 29 catches for 317 yards and seven touchdowns.
The 5-11, 233-pound Trayanum has one year of eligibility remaining after playing the 2020 and 2021 seasons at Arizona State and the last two seasons at Ohio State. He has played in 27 games and has run for 1,157 yards and 13 touchdowns while averaging 5.1 yards per carry. He has 15 receptions for 91 yards.
He will give UK six scholarship running backs next year as he’ll join Demie Sumo-Karngbaye, La’Vell Wright and Jamarion Wilcox off last year’s team along with incoming freshmen Jason Patterson and Tovani Mizell.
Last season at Ohio State he ran for 373 yards and three touchdowns (4.4 yards per carry) and scored the game-winning touchdown against Notre Dame. He was second on the team in yards and scoring behind TreVeyon Henderson.
He’s from Akron — an area Marrow knows well — and helped Archbishop Hoban High School win three state titles playing running back and linebacker during his four years as a starter.
His junior season he ran for 1,313 yards and 26 scores on only 106 carries and had 60 tackles, eight sacks, five forced fumbles, and 10 pass breakups. He was hurt part of his senior season but ran for 250 yards and four touchdowns on just carries against Cardinal Mooney High School, the alma mater of Marrow and UK coach Mark Stoops.
He was a four-star recruit pursued by Penn State, Wisconsin, Florida, LSU, Michigan, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Boston College, Florida, Notre Dame, Purdue, Rutgers, Stanford, Toledo, Vanderbilt, Virginia and West Virginia.
Trayanum picked Arizona State and played in four games as a freshman and ran for 290 yards and four touchdowns while averaging 5.9 yards per try. He ran for 84 yards and two scores in a loss to USC and ran for 108 yards in a loss to UCLA.
He played in nine games in 2021 and averaged 5.2 yards per run while gaining 402 yards and scoring six times.
Trayanum transferred to Ohio State and was moved to linebacker. However, he played mainly running back and special teams in 2022. Last season he was the backup running back and now he’s bringing his powerful running style to Kentucky.
