Former ASU offensive lineman Leif Fautanu's legendary time in Tempe didn't start off on the right foot.
Fautanu's plane landed in Phoenix without him even knowing his head coach's name. Thinking head coach Kenny Dillingham was a graduate assistant, Fautanu shook Dillingham's hand and moved on before asking who he was.
"That’s the head coach," then-graduate assistant Steve Miller told him.
Realization and embarrassment seeped in. Fautanu thinks it's funny now, but he swears it wasn't then. Now, 1,806 snaps later, Fautanu built a legacy as the Sun Devils' rock in the offensive line after years of working to get to this moment.
"I told him that this was the best decision I ever made in my life," Fautanu said. "We had our moment after the (Texas) game, and us, me and Coach T (Tuitele) also had our moment after the game where I feel like this was the best decision ever made in my life, to come to ASU."
Fautanu is now preparing for the NFL Draft in April. He was the first prospect offensive line coach Saga Tuitele brought to the program.
"He's a genuine person," Tuitele said. "He's someone you can easily care about, you can love really fast … They're all like my sons and Leif, especially because he was the first one that committed when we came here."
Fautanu’s strong character followed him throughout college. This past season, he was on the Pat Tillman leadership council with 11 other Sun Devils.
"I can work with many different people," Fautanu said. "That's what a leader is, the power to influence somebody. And that's what I tried to do, in my career, to influence people to work hard and do the right thing."
ASU offensive coordinator Marcus Arroyo, who coached Fautanu at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, has high praise for the future NFL pick.
"I can't say enough good things about Leif," Arroyo said. "Obviously, having had him at the last stop (UNLV), I knew right away that he was going to be a guy we were going to build a young roster around that was going to take off."
Fautanu’s journey was anything but typical growing up in Hawaii. His school, University Laboratory School, didn't have a football team when he was growing up.
Fautanu played for the PAC-5 Wolfpack to get on a football field and played defensive tackle, center and long snapper and even saw stints as the team's punter.
"That's where I feel like I developed that underdog mentality," Fautanu said. "I feel I have to prove people wrong and stuff like that. That's kind of where my mentality started."
His talent led him to the 2019 Polynesian Bowl. Fautanu was humbled by superior competition and felt he needed to improve to keep playing.
Fautanu didn't have to look far for help as he has two uncles who played college football and one who made the NFL for a short time. Besides his family's help, Fautanu showcased the drive to improve every day.
"Having those two in my life helped me to get a head start in high school, with lifting and the same techniques that we learned in college," Fautanu said. "It helps me, learning from a defensive lineman on what the defensive line is looking at."
A surprise unfolded when Fautanu started his college career at UNLV instead of Hawaii, where his uncles and dad attended. At UNLV, he caught the attention of now-SMU offensive line coach Garin Justice, and the two worked closely to improve his game.
"We were just trying to get him more efficient in his movement," Justice said. "A lot of that just went through his background and his teachings. Our job as coaches is to eliminate leaks like inefficiencies in how he moves."
It wasn't just the raw talent Fautanu had out of high school that led to his UNLV offer. Justice was immediately impressed by Fautanu's personality when he made the trip to Hawaii for his favorite home visit he'd ever been on.
The culture Dillingham wanted to build at ASU aligned perfectly with what Tuitele knows about Polynesian culture. He knows what to expect from kids who were raised in families like Fautanu's.
"Our people from the South Pacific have big hearts and are unselfish," Tuitele said. "That's what we're trying to build here. It more fits the culture of the team. It fits in with how a lot of these Polynesian kids are raised."
Fautanu was looking for tough love from his coaches to improve as a player and push himself. He found that at ASU.
"Coach T ( Saga Tuitele) is very transparent," Fautanu said. "Coach Dillingham is very transparent and, he'll tell you how it is. And I feel like that's how I learned best as a player because it helps me to develop on what I need to work on."
Fautanu’s journey has been defined by hard work and resilience. Whether his name is called or not, his work ethic won’t change, and he'll surely take the next step in his playing career.
Edited by Jack Barron, Sophia Ramirez and Natalia Jarrett.
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Daniel is a senior studying sports journalism. This is his first semester with The State Press. He has also worked at WCSN, OC Riptide, 1550 Sports and AZPreps365.
