When asked recently about tight end Rocky Lencioni, Montana State offensive coordinator Pete Sterbick spent a few minutes detailing the Bozeman product’s many skills. Then he summed it up in seven words.
“He’s a lot of fun to be around,” Sterbick said.
The plays Lencioni has made in two seasons as a regular in the MSU offense make that easy to see.
Time and again, Lencioni looks like a wide receiver. He did it again last Saturday at Idaho State. With the Bobcats trailing 20-13 late, he lined up wide left on fourth-and-10, sprinted straight downfield against a Bengal cornerback and used his size to haul in a fade from Justin Lamson just inside the front corner of the end zone. The catch tied the game and eventually forced overtime.
Lencioni, in fact, played wide receiver at Bozeman High. The 6-foot-4 athlete is now a 247-pound tight end. And as iconic and crucial to MSU’s season as that fourth-down catch was, it wasn’t the first time he’s pulled off such a feat.
In last season’s national semifinal against Montana, Lencioni fully extended for a diving catch on a 34-yard bomb from Lamson, hauling it in at the UM 5-yard line with a defensive back draped over him. The play set up a Lamson touchdown run that put the Bobcats in full command, 41-23, with just under eight minutes to play.
Lamson deserves a chunk of the credit, but Lencioni’s versatility and high football IQ let the MSU staff put four tight ends on the field at times. He can line up wide and challenge defensive backs enough to keep them from crowding the line of scrimmage.
“He’s pretty smart, which allows him to move around,” Sterbick said. “Obviously, you can’t do that with somebody if they’re not able to understand where they need to be and I think having played receiver naturally helps that. He just has good football knowledge and knows our system to the point where we can be versatile.”
Even so, Sterbick believes he can use Lencioni in more ways still.
“Honestly, I think in some ways I’ve probably underutilized him at times,” Sterbick said. “Guys play a certain position and sometimes they get stuck in that spot. As we’ve gone forward, I’ve just tried to maximize all the guys that we have, but he’s a guy that we’ve done that (with the most). Looking back, I wish I would’ve done what we’re doing (sooner). He’s such a competitor and he’s got a good balance of abilities for his size and ball skills and he runs pretty well. You just see guys do things in practice and I try to keep really open-minded schematically. He’s one of those guys that you can see do stuff and you’re like, hey, let’s do this. He keeps evolving all the time, I don’t think you should ever stop when you got players like him.”
Lencioni drew offers from numerous academically prestigious schools, including Ivy League programs. Sterbick says that intelligence translates to the field, and that Lencioni goes the extra mile to make sure he’s on the same page.
“He’s just pushing the envelope and making sure he has clarity on what we’re asking him to do,” Sterbick said. “Really paying attention and understanding the finite details of the scheme and not really putting a ceiling on it and trying to find out what else is out there for him. You always think of more than you end up doing. There’s things that we think of and maybe we come back to them.
“We had receiver injuries in fall camp, so for two-minute drill one time we went 11 personnel (one running back and one tight end, with Lencioni lined up at wide receiver) and he just looked really good out there and we were just like that’s a kid that we can treat like a receiver. Just make sure he understands that he has to translate his thought process to that position. It’s a lot of fun having guys like him.”
That alignment paid off against the Bengals. Lencioni split out on the play, and Lamson never looked elsewhere before lobbing the pass to a target he trusts.
“I think it comes down to probably more Justin in the moment,” MSU head coach Brent Vigen said of the play. “But Rocky, I think he’s proven that he’s a playmaker. He’s capable. He was a receiver in high school, so I think how to operate out there is a little more natural to him because of that. That’s one of those situations if he gets single coverage, Justin clearly has the opportunity to go there, and then he’s got to feel really good about that matchup. That’s why I say it’s a little more on Justin being able to trust him, and they clearly have that trust. And if they play two to that side, for whatever configuration that coverage might be, then he’s got a concept to the three-man side.”
After an ISU field goal, MSU drove 55 yards in eight plays to the Bengal 20. The Bobcats looked primed to score after a roughing-the-quarterback penalty wiped out an ISU interception and gave them a first down. But the momentum vanished when Lamson threw three straight incompletions deep, leaving MSU facing fourth-and-10 with 2:35 left.
Figuring his team wouldn’t get the ball back and needed a touchdown anyway, Vigen made the easy call to go for it.
MSU stopped the Bengals on their next possession, then won in overtime when another Bozeman tight end, Rylan Schlepp, caught the game-winning two-point conversion from wide receiver Dane Steel.
Lencioni graduated from Bozeman High in 2024. The previous fall, he led the Hawks to an undefeated state title, and he finished his career second on the school’s all-time receiving list. He caught 60 passes for 972 yards and seven touchdowns as a senior after posting 56 catches for 966 yards and 11 touchdowns as a junior, earning first-team all-state honors both seasons. He also made all-state on defense both years, intercepting five passes as a junior and three as a senior, and was named offensive MVP for the East team in the 2024 Montana Shrine Game.
Lencioni also handled the Hawks’ kicking, making seven of 10 field goals over his sophomore and junior seasons and converting 76 of 78 extra points. He starred on Bozeman’s highly touted basketball team, too.
Last season, he led MSU tight ends with 19 catches for 206 yards and scored six touchdowns, fourth-most on the team. With at least three games left this season, he has already topped two of those marks with 22 catches for 267 yards, adding two touchdowns. He ranks third on the team in receiving yards and fourth in receptions.
Lencioni and the Bobcats chase a third straight Big Sky Conference title — and their fourth in five years — Saturday at noon at Northern Colorado in Greeley.
