Patriots Drafting This Prospect Would Serve As Full-Circle Moment

Geoffrey Jamiel and Elic Ayomanor were introduced the summer before they started at Deerfield Academy, a college-preparatory boarding school in Deerfield, Mass. The two wide receivers shared a passion for football, but their journeys to that point were vastly different.

As far back as he could remember, Jamiel had a football in his hands. It was a product of growing up in a football-obsessed household on Cape Cod. His father, Joe, played at Brown University while older brothers Joseph and Andrew played at Sacred Heart and Stonehill, respectively. All three brothers, who grew up diehard New England Patriots fans, resembled the stature of Julian Edelman much more than Rob Gronkowski.

Ayomanor, on the other hand, hailed from the Canadian hockey hotbed of Medicine Hat, Alberta. His middle school doubled as a hockey academy and he rotated daily between class and hockey. At 6-foot-1 and 180 pounds, he looked every bit of an athlete. Some close to him thought he could be an Olympic track athlete, but Ayomanor wanted to go in a different athletic direction.

Ayomanor picked up a football at 13, fell in love and proceeded to set lofty goals.

“The day I met him he talked about, ‘I’m going to go to Stanford, I’m going to go to the NFL, then I’m going to do this and do that,'” Jamiel told NESN.com.

Ayomanor accomplished his first goal when he committed to Stanford in August 2021. He received 26 college offers but opted for the education as much as the gridiron. The physically gifted wideout (6-foot-2, 206 pounds, 4.44 40-yard dash) caught 125 passes for 1,844 yards and 12 touchdowns in 24 games with the Cardinal, including a record-setting 294-yard performance against Colorado’s Travis Hunter in October 2023.

Ayomanor will accomplish his second goal when he’s selected in the 2025 NFL Draft. He’s one of the top receiver prospects, projected as a Day 2 pick.

Jamiel, like the rest of Ayomanor’s family and close friends, will be in Medicine Hat when it happens. It only makes sense for Jamiel to travel to Ayomanor’s home given Ayomanor might not be there without the Jamiel family.

“I think those guys are the ones who really helped him get to where he is today,” said Justin Dillon, a longtime consultant for Ayomanor. “I know he thanks them a lot. He always talks about that. Without them, he doesn’t believe he would be where he is.”

It was late spring/early summer in 2020 — a period when every day blends together. The COVID-19 pandemic prompted Jamiel to leave Dennis-Yarmouth Regional High — and a football program where the Jamiel name was like royalty — with the public high school season about to be suspended. Right around the same time, Ayomanor opted to leave The Peddie School (Hightstown, New Jersey) and start at Deerfield, his runner-up the year prior.

Deerfield Academy head football coach Brian Barbato connected the two like-minded transfer students. Barbato thought they would hit it off — he was right.

“First time I met him, he stayed at my house for a whole week, week-and-a-half,” Jamiel said. “He basically moved right in.”

Ayomanor left Canada at just 16 to pursue his dream in the U.S. He was still trying to fully integrate himself, and at the time it was impossible to travel back and forth across the border. He spent the summer at the Jamiels in West Yarmouth, Mass., sitting at the family dinner table, working at Joe Jamiel’s restaurant and training with the Jamiel brothers.

“He was a part of my family immediately,” Jamiel said.

Ayomanor fine-tuned his route-running and honed his craft in Massachusetts. The next two years were spent either on campus or at the Jamiel residence. The two teenagers spent hours in the family’s basement gym, furnished with used equipment from a local gym selling off parts during the pandemic. There was a turf strip and pass-catching machine to go along with it. Sometimes, they went to a local field for high-level drills designed by (and for) Division I players.

“Geoffrey and the Jamiels are as polished as route-runners as you’re ever going to see,” Barbato said.

Andrew Jamiel played in the XFL after breaking numerous records at Stonehill. Geoffrey Jamiel is the fourth member of the family to play Division I football, set to enter his senior season at Lehigh University.

The technical aspects have always been the most important for the undersized Jamiel brothers, and the most important for Ayomanor to develop. The details and nuances of route-running and football IQ might not come as easy to Canadian-born players, who are more raw. But Ayomanor observed, practiced and observed some more. His improvement was evident.

“They got him ready,” Dillon said. “They got him ready.”

It paid off.

Dillon, whose 730 Scouting business helps Canadian-born football players transition to the U.S. in hopes those players will land a college scholarship, worked with Ayomanor for years before he got the call.

He first heard about Ayomanor after one of his 730 Scouting spotters coached Ayomanor during an all-star game in Canada.

One look at the highlight reel was enough.

“I watched three clips and I was sold right then and there,” said Dillon, who started 730 Scouting in 2009 and worked with Buffalo Bills’ Josh Palmer at the time he heard about Ayomanor.

“I just knew the way Elic’s body moved, what he was doing, I just knew he was going to be special.”

Dillon, after receiving permission from Ayomanor’s mother, Pam Weiterman, started to contact prep school coaches in the states. Ayomanor visited a few schools on the East Coast before he decided on The Peddie School, where fellow Canadian-born receiver John Metchie III played. Ayomanor suffered a broken collarbone midway through the 2019 season and left for Deerfield after a coaching change.

Remember that aforementioned call? It was the product of a route-running video Ayomanor filmed with Barbato after the summer with the Jamiel family. Those videos for scouts were commonplace during the pandemic given the lack of game tape — Deerfield was limited to three or four intrasquad scrimmages in 2020. It went “viral” in the scouting community, Dillon said.

“Teams were calling me, schools were calling them,” Dillon said. “Everybody called and everybody offered.”

That’s when Dillon knew Ayomanor was one step closer to his dream. That’s also when he knew his promise to Weiterman was about to come true.

“Does it suck that we have to do this? Absolutely. Because you’re taking a kid away from his parents to go chase a dream,” Dillon said. “But if you choose the right kid, that sacrifice, and that dream is going to be worth it. As we see with Elic.”

Ayomanor, who also excelled in the classroom at Deerfield with a 95 average, received offers from six Ivy League schools including Brown, Columbia, Dartmouth, Penn, Princeton and Yale. They were accompanied by big-time football programs like Notre Dame, Penn State, Ole Miss and Tennessee, which was the runner-up to Stanford.

Barbato flew to Stanford with Ayomanor, who was told he’d have to participate in a camp before the Cardinal could offer. Ayomanor didn’t care, Barbato said, because it was his dream school. He received an offer that day.

“The rest is history,” the Deerfield coach said.

Jamiel doesn’t forget how Ayomanor spoke his dreams into existence the first time they met. He’s now trying to do the same, making it clear he hopes his friend and former teammate returns to the area.

Jamiel joked that he sends Ayomanor a screenshot every time a draft expert predicts he’ll land with the Patriots, and tells Ayomanor no quarterback is better for him than Drake Maye.

“We’re definitely a Patriots family,” Jamiel said. “So when he was living with me, he was emersed into it.”

It certainly would provide a full-circle moment for Ayomanor. And the Jamiel family.