With the game tied at 35 in triple overtime on Saturday, sophomore running back Paul Stanton scampered 17 yards for a game-winning touchdown against Holy Cross. The run was fourteen years in the making.

“I picked up football when I was five,” Stanton said. “My dad coached me, and when I started playing, I immediately knew that I wanted to play running back. I’ve basically been playing running back for my whole life now.”

Both passion and talent drove him to a successful career at Jesuit High School in New Orleans, La., where he lettered three times in football, played starting running back for two years, captained the team as a senior, and led the team to its first 12-0 season since 1946.

When the college recruiting season came around, however, it was purely by chance that Stanton landed on Harvard’s radar.

“I went to all the other Ivy League football camps,” Stanton said. “And someone at Brown told me, ‘There is also a camp at Harvard, you should check it out.’ So I did, performed pretty well there, and that’s when they started recruiting me.”

Head coach Tim Murphy still recalls the memorable impression Stanton made on him and his coaching staff as a high school athlete.

“He was just one of those players that, when [I] watched the films, stood out as fast and athletic but kind of small,” Murphy recalled. “But the more [I] watched the films, the more I thought, ‘Wow, this guy can really play.’ The other coaches who watched him agreed as well.”

Stanton’s talent earned him valuable playing time in several games for the Crimson while he learned from his teammates, particularly starting running back Treavor Scales ’13.

“I tried to learn as much as possible from Treavor,” Stanton recalled. “And when I got the opportunity to compete, I simply tried to do my best out on the field.”

Saturday at Fitton Field, Stanton delivered the defining performance of his Harvard career so far, putting an end to what is tied as the longest game in Harvard football’s 140-year history and propelling the Crimson to a perfect 3-0 (1-0 Ivy) record. Harvard has only had one other triple-overtime game, which came against Yale in 2005. The game-winning play in the 2005 edition of The Game was also a rush, made by running back Clifton Dawson.

“When I made the first cut, I pretty much saw daylight,” Stanton recalled. “So I knew I was going to be able to score. When I actually scored, it was the greatest feeling ever, the fact that we came out on top of such a game, one of the most brutal games I have played through. It was just a great feeling that I was able to do that for my team.”

For his performance against Holy Cross, Stanton was awarded the John Turco Memorial Trophy, presented annually to the most outstanding player in Holy Cross’ homecoming game. Overall, Stanton rushed 21 carries for 103 yards and scored two touchdowns, while also amassing 55 receiving yards.

“I think ‘emerge’ is the word,” Murphy said about Stanton, who has seen increased playing time since sophomore Zach Boden went down with injury. “[Stanton] is clearly a tremendous player. He’s fast, he’s athletic, he’s instinctive, but he’s tougher, more physical, and more versatile than we give him credit for.… What was truly amazing last weekend was how many yards he got after contact. He broke several tackles, pushed the pile, and was very instinctive about where the best place to run the football was.”

Stanton’s talent and work ethic has also left a positive mark on his teammates.

“[Stanton] is very dedicated to the craft [of football],” captain Josh Boyd said. “He works extremely hard during the lifts, he always focuses during practice, and he is respected by all of his teammates by way of the work he puts in and the tenacity he runs the football with.”

“With Treavor now gone, he has really stepped up as an athlete and as a leader,” he added. “This is only his second year of playing, but he has shown flashes of brilliance that make us think he will become one of the best [running] backs in the league.”

Heading into the faceoff against Cornell this weekend and the remainder of the 2013 season, Murphy believes that Stanton will play a crucial role for the Crimson.

“He is the kind of player that can give us that diverse offense that we really believe in,” Murphy said. “He is legitimate. There is no question that he is one of our best offensive options.”