How MSU's Armorion Smith Deals With Being ‘Three Different People'
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EAST LANSING, Mich. --- Life as a student-athlete is busy. There's practice and other team activities every single day, but there's also classes and homework that need to be done in pursuit of a degree.
Now, imagine having to help raise four of your own siblings on top of that. That's what Michigan State safety Armorion Smith does day in and day out.
Smith's mother passed away last year from breast cancer and his father is not a part of the picture. As the oldest sibling (with help from his eldest sister), Smith is the legal guardian of the four youngest members of his family.
- "Basically, I'm like three different persons; like three different people in one day," Smith said Wednesday. "I've got to be a parent. I've got to be an athlete. I've got to be a student."
To do that, it requires him to manage his time rigorously.
- "Each day I have a schedule," he said. "My mornings, my first half of the day is me being a student-athlete. I have to go out with my football, school, and everything I have to do.
- "Then I know my siblings have school. I drop them off in the morning. I try to find a way around everything, make it work for everybody. So, I get them to school, and while they're in school, I know they're safe and everything. I don't have anything to worry about, so I can focus. Then when I'm done, I get a parent mode. I'll pick them up from school, drop them off, feed them, things of that nature."
Working with the Football Staff
Of course, being a parent is going to lead to some conflicts with the schedule of a Power Four football team sometimes. Smith says that the staff at Michigan State have been helpful for him with that.
- "Our schedule, I work around it with my coaches and let them know any conflicts or anything," he said. "They understand that and it's been giving me some grace to be here as much as I can. And then, just being a parent, I just try to manage the time."
Help from Others
Smith has also gotten support from both teammates and some of their families. He showed some appreciation to the families of Nick Marsh, Aidan Chiles, and Jordan Hall when asked about that help.
- "It's been amazing to have, especially, women in your life that actually care about you and genuinely look out for you," Smith said. "Despite my situation and everything, they've always been good women before all of this happened.
- "I met them before, and then just being able to lean on them and stuff, through all of this stuff, just making me feel better about the situation and all that. I have people that actually care about me and pour support into me. Whenever I need help, I can reach out to them, and it's just been amazing.
- "We built relationships with my siblings; they have relationships with my siblings. So it's not just me, it's all of us. We always can count on them.
- "I appreciate Nick's family, Aidan's mom and his family, Jordan's mom and her family. It's just been amazing."
What Coaches, Teammates Said
- "Absolutely not," is what MSU safeties coach James Adams said when asked if he thinks he could imagine that level of responsibility Smith has at his age. "I tell him all the time how grateful I am for him, how proud I am of him, and how much I'm learning from him, because I couldn't have done what he's done at that age."
- "He's a great leader," said cornerback Malcolm Bell. "And he always keeps his head up. For someone that goes through what he's going through, he's extremely strong, especially at this age and with all the responsibility that he has been handed. He's handling it very well and he shows maturity throughout the locker room and throughout the game."
- "Me and Armorion have a relationship outside here (football), too," defensive back Ade Willie said. "Just checking up on him (is important), making sure he's good. Even though he won't show it; he's a dawg. You won't know. You just have to know and really ask questions and really, 'You good, bro?' Stuff like that.
- "That's my brother. It's like blood, so I've got to check up, make sure he's good."
Still Performing On The Field
- "He still comes in here with a smile on his face and balls out," Willie also said. "That's why I say he's got to be the mentally strongest person that I know. I don't know anybody else that's just got all that on their plate and is just handling it like how he's handled it."
Smith has been put into a starting role for Michigan State in its first two games. He made one of the biggest plays of the team's win over Boston College, breaking up a pass during double overtime that helped set up the walk-off conversion from Chiles to Omari Kelly a couple snaps later.
If Smith doesn't make get to that pass, Kelly's two-point conversion only forces triple overtime. Instead, it got to be one of the biggest plays of the last few seasons for the Spartans.
- "He answered the call," Adams said about that play. "I love those moments, because that's why I coach."
- "I'm just trying to give my all for the team," Smith said. "I break my back for them. I give whatever I have for my team. In that moment, we just needed a stop, no matter who it was. For me to make that stop, it just felt good to take some pressure off our offense to win the game in the next drive."
After the BC game, Smith says he and his siblings stayed up until about 4 a.m. hanging out.
- "They watched me go through all of these things, and they went through it with me," Smith said about the relationship between his siblings and his football career. "It's just like, you still didn't fold, you didn't give up, you didn't throw in the white towel. You were able to overcome adversity, and we sat there and we talked about it, and I'm a role model to them, so it's huge for them."
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A 2025 graduate from Michigan State University, Cotsonika brings a wealth of experience covering the Spartans from Rivals and On3 to his role as Michigan State Spartans Beat Writer on SI. At Michigan State, he was also a member of the world-renowned Spartan marching band for two seasons.
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