Isiah King: The King of the North 

Behind every great collegiate defense, there are always one or two players who act as the anchor and lead the group in key situations. For the Idaho Vandals, that anchor is redshirt senior linebacker Isiah King.  

“He’s an all-conference guy for a reason,” Ford said. “That guy comes to work every day ready to go. You saw his physicality, his length, his speed; he’s really the total package in terms of a second-level defender.” 

King is a senior at the university, majoring in recreational sports tourism management. He was born and raised in San Diego, California. In 2021, he graduated from Montgomery High School, where he played wide receiver and safety. Though his senior season was shortened due to COVID, King was first-team all-league as a junior after recording 25 tackles and three interceptions.  

Despite being built more like a linebacker than a defensive back, he was recruited by Paul Petrino’s coaching staff as a safety. He played in three games during his redshirt season, accumulating three tackles to go along with a 20-yard reception. After that season, Jason Eck took over the head coaching duties in Moscow, and King was moved to linebacker.  

Since then, King has been a quintessential component of the Vandal defense as they earned their identity of constant physicality. He played in six games as a redshirt freshman, finishing with 19 total tackles. This included a five-tackle game in the season finale, and a four-tackle game plus an interception against Portland State.  

In his junior year, on a 2024 Idaho team that was very talented defensively, King played in all games but one, and was seventh on the team with 48 tackles. He also had two tackles for loss, a fumble recovery and two interceptions.  

Though his 2024 season was certainly his best yet, King worked tirelessly all offseason to improve his game and make the jump from his junior to senior year. His main focus in terms of improvement throughout the offseason was tackling.  

After Jaxton Eck and Zach Johnson, two of the teams’ top three tacklers from 2024, transferred, King became the most experienced returning linebacker on the 2025 roster under first-year head coach Thomas Ford Jr.  

This is a very new group of guys consisting of a lot of freshmen and transfers, and King’s presence as a leader has been crucial.  

“I just remember when I was a freshman, all the vets were helping me out,” King said. “It’s crazy just being in that position, being able to use my past experiences to help out these young guys and just help contribute wins to the football team.” 

Prior to the season, King’s name always came up when Ford was asked who he looks for to lead his defense under a new coaching staff. Ford loves the ferocity and the competitive edge that King carries with him in every snap.  

“Isaiah is a special talent,” Ford said. “We all know it here. He does it at a very high level, and it’s not a surprise to anyone in our building.”  

It didn’t even take one game for King to get back into the swing of things as the heart of the Vandal defense in 2025. In the season opener against Washington State, King recorded career-highs of 10 tackles and two and a half tackles for loss. Through five games, he has 36 tackles, five tackles for loss, one and a half sacks and a forced fumble.  

Football and family have always gone hand-in-hand for King, who says he quickly felt a family-like bond upon his arrival in Moscow. King says his love for football developed when he was a kid and would watch his brother play.  

“I have an older brother, and just watching him and going to his games, I just fell in love with it,” King said.  

Aside from the obvious transition of going from safety to linebacker, King says the biggest change in his playstyle since his freshman year is his newfound football intelligence, specifically being patient in pursuit.

He has made extreme strides in terms of mental growth as a Big Sky linebacker over the past few seasons. He prides himself on his physicality and his speed, but also on his ballhawk abilities that he acquired through the years of playing wideout and safety.  

Of all his moments donning the Vandal silver and gold, a few different moments from games against Big Sky rivals from Montana stand out to King. He had an interception against Montana State in the FCS quarterfinals in 2024, and his favorite collegiate victory was winning the Brown Stein in 2023. 

King is no stranger to personnel changes in the coaching staff, with this being the third different staff he’s played under at Idaho. He said that despite most defenses running similar coverages, this year’s defense is more versatile than last year’s defense.  

King said the culture throughout the program is pretty similar to how it was under Eck, but “we’re just a tight-knit group who cares about each other and we’re going to go to war for each other when it’s game day. Everyone on the team has a tight bond with each other.”  

Liam Bradford can be reached at [email protected].