Inside Max Iheanachor's incredible journey from Nigerian football newbie to Steelers first-rounder

Cory DeSanti had a basketball player in his program. That player had a fellow Nigerian friend he brought to practice one day. That kid was a 6-foot-6 monster named Max Iheanachor who had quick feet, a broad frame and not an ounce of knowledge about football.

Unless that "football" was soccer.

"He didn't even know what a football was," Bobby Godinez, his first football coach, told the Post-Gazette on Friday. "He didn't know if it was stuffed or blown up."

DeSanti also had a high school friend who coached football at East Los Angeles College, a two-year school that made national news in 2019 when it sent a female safety named Toni Harris to a scholarship at a four-year program. That friend was Godinez, and in 2021, along came Iheanachor.

As an AAU basketball coach, DeSanti had an understanding with Godinez that if he ever got a hooper who might have some football potential, they'd make the connection. Five years later, Iheanachor was a first-round pick as an offensive lineman, going to the Steelers at No. 21 overall Thursday night in the NFL Draft here in Pittsburgh.

Nine years ago, Iheanachor came to the U.S. from Nigeria with parents trying to set up their family with a better life, a journey that now leads him to Pittsburgh.

"Man, it's beautiful," Iheanachor said Friday as he was introduced by team president Art Rooney II at the UPMC Rooney Sports Complex. "Coming out of that tunnel, bam, it just hit me."

Baby steps

His name is pronounced ee-haw-nuh-chor, and before he crossed the Fort Pitt Bridge for the first time, Iheanachor had to leave his own draft party in Los Angeles to get on a red-eye flight.

Long before that, Iheanachor was in the dark.

"There were times we weren't sure if we were gonna make it," Godinez reflected. "He called me in the midst of year one. ‘My mom, we don't think this is the right spot for me. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know if I'm progressing.' We had a lot of long talks with him, and he'll tell you about second-guessing himself."

DeSanti, a former college football player himself at Washington State, saw a strong, nimble athlete who could easily carry more weight. Iheanachor was around 240 pounds when he enrolled in college and joined the football team. He's now 325.

A lot of In-N-Out burgers were sandwiched around the first steps of learning how to be an offensive tackle. Iheanachor readily admits his parents are like many in their culture. They wanted him to go to a four-year university and become a doctor, maybe a lawyer. Instead, he was toiling away at a community college, trying to figure out how to play an entirely new sport in practice while not seeing any playing time in games.

"What the hell is an A-gap? A B-gap?" Iheanachor remembered thinking. "It was like, ‘You've got to know all these things.' I'm like, ‘Bro, you can't just line up and go block?' "

But DeSanti, whom Iheanachor credits as being a person God put in his life to steer him to football, raves about Iheanachor's intelligence. So does Godinez, who took the handoff from DeSanti and was the first person to run behind Iheanachor.

Eventually, it all clicked. Iheanachor settled in at right tackle. Before long, Godinez actually felt bad that their offensive schemes weren't challenging enough for their brightest prospect.

"Once he saw the light at the end of the tunnel, saw the recruitment pick up, saw that other coaches saw what I saw, the rest was history," Godinez said. "He just took off."

‘God's plan'

It's fitting that when Saga Tuitele discovered Iheanachor and offered him a scholarship, he was actually looking to recruit a different guy to Fresno State.

Godinez had another humongous tackle who was good, but he didn't have nearly the same movement skills as Iheanachor, raw as he was at the time. When Tuitele let it slip that he was likely headed to Arizona State as their offensive line coach, Godinez recommended he take a chance on Iheanachor.

Late Thursday, the world found out that the Steelers were looking for someone else, too.

General manager Omar Khan's premature draft call to USC receiver Makai Lemon went viral, after the Philadelphia Eagles swooped in before the Steelers were on the clock and could take Lemon themselves.

The Steelers pivoted to Iheanachor, the next-best player on their draft board. They might not view him as a consolation prize, but it's unusual - perhaps even awkward - for such a public display of a team missing out on their top choice for their pick.

"It probably hasn't even crossed his mind at all," said DeSanti, who talked to Iheanachor after the Lemon mess hit the Internet. "I bet you he doesn't even know anything about it. He's oblivious to that kind of stuff. He doesn't care. He's gonna be like, ‘They took me. Somebody believed in me.' He's gonna give everything he's got."

Sure enough, Iheanachor acknowledged that happenstance continues to follow him throughout his career. To him, it's divine intervention.

There he was Friday receiving his No. 71 Steelers jersey, the same number he wore back when he first started out at East Los Angeles. Back then, he was just a ball of clay that a couple of old friends thought they might be able to mold. Now, he steps into sky-high expectations in Pittsburgh.

"Honestly, man, everything happens for a reason," Iheanachor said. "That's how [Tuitele] met me, and I can't be mad at that. He also got to recruit the other tackle that was there, too. He was a hell of a good player. It's just all God's plan."

Far from home

Iheanachor arrived in the U.S. wide-eyed.

His family lived in Atlanta for their first six months. He'd watched plenty of American movies, but never imagined running around trying to catch snowflakes with his younger brother, Mark, who was by his side at Friday's press conference.

Now, Iheanachor can rattle off the names of past and present Steelers offensive tackles, from Marvel Smith to Broderick Jones to Troy Fautanu and even Andrus Peat. One of Iheanachor's first welcome texts actually came from Fautanu, the Steelers' top pick in 2024.

"For my parents, just making that transition, sacrificing everything they had built back home to put us in a better position for education," Iheanachor said, "big shout-out to them."

Of course, their idea was to come here for the education. Iheanachor got that, but he found football.

More accurately, football found him.

The biggest headline Iheanachor made leading up to the draft was when New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel jumped into a drill with him at the Arizona State pro day and tried to wrestle him like a pass rusher. Decision-makers in the NFL want to test everything about a player, from his football IQ to his toughness to his passion.

"I wasn't really questioned about that," Iheanachor said. "Just the way I go about things, if you have a question about my love for the game, then you've just got to watch harder - how I do [stuff], and just what I go about, and what I'm about as a man."

Yes, Iheanachor was a late bloomer, but he's not just playing because he's big. He put in the work, the sweat, and came out on the other side of the tunnel.

The Steelers' process in landing Iheanachor will go down as one of the stranger draft stories in franchise history. Iheanachor's process gives the franchise confidence that it all unfolded the right way.

"My father-in-law and brother-in-law are both die-hard Steelers fans," said DeSanti, who was at Iheanachor's draft party, along with Godinez. "We were going crazy over here. I didn't know what to do. Max didn't even realize how big a deal it was to get drafted that high with where he's come from. He was just so grateful. What a great character this kid is."

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