INDIANAPOLIS – Never mind that the last running back the Broncos selected from Notre Dame didn’t work out. They might grab another one early in the 2026 draft.

The Broncos have plenty of interest in Fighting Irish stalwart Jadarian Price, who is expected to be a late first-round pick or a second-round selection in the April 23-25 draft in Pittsburgh. Denver holds the No. 30 pick in the first round.

In 2024, the Broncos selected running back Audric Estime out of Notre Dame in the fifth round, and he was waived after one season. But Price has more versatility than Estime.

Playing behind Fighting Irish star Jeremiyah Love, who rushed for 1,372 yards, Price ran for 674 yards in 2025 while averaging 6.0 per carry. He also led the nation in kickoff returns with a 37.5-yard average on 12 attempts while bringing two back for touchdowns.

Price, rated by most analysts as the second-best back in the draft after Love, had a formal interview with the Broncos at the scouting combine in Indianapolis. He came away from it pleased.

“The Denver meeting went well,’’ Price said Friday, a day before taking the field Saturday at Lucas Oil Stadium for combine drills. “Just the questions they asked and the answers I followed up with, I thought I did pretty well, and I think they like me.”

Head coach Sean Payton at the combine called running back one of Denver’s “musts” in terms of offseason needs. The Broncos’ top back in 2025, J.K. Dobbins, will become a free agent in March after he rushed for 774 yards in 10 games before being lost for the season with a foot injury. The top back the Broncos have under contract for 2026 is RJ Harvey, a second-round pick in 2025 who ran for 540 yards as a rookie but averaged just 3.7 per carry.

A source said Friday the Broncos will not tender restricted free-agent running back Jaleel McLaughlin, which will make him unrestricted. The Broncos did not want to put a tender on McLaughlin for $3.5 million for the right of first refusal but do have an interest in re-signing him at a lesser figure.

Also Friday, a source said the Broncos are anticipated to sign exclusive rights free agent Tyler Badie to a one-year, $1.075 million deal. However, Badie, a third-down back used in 2025 primarily for pass protection, had just 23 yards rushing.

The Broncos had formal interviews with at least two other running backs at the combine in Emmett Johnson of Nebraska and Jonah Coleman of Washington. Both might be mid-round selections.

Nebraska running back Emmett Johnson speaks during a news conference at the NFL football scouting combine in Indianapolis, Friday, Feb. 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)

If the Broncos want to snag Price, they likely would need to do so at No. 30 or with a second-round pick. He is an explosive runner who likely would have piled up very big numbers had he not been playing behind Love, who finished third in the Heisman Trophy voting.

“(Price) has the opportunity and the potential to be one of the best running backs in the league,’’ Love said. “As long as he goes into it with a humble mind and just a hunger to work and just competes, the sky’s the limit for (Price). He’s going to do great things in the league and he’s going to play for a long time.”

Love called it “valuable” that Price provides the dimension he does on kickoff returns. The Broncos are looking for a threat on kickoffs to line up on the opposite side of star returner Marvin Mims Jr. to prevent teams from having the easy option of kicking away from Mims.

“I think when you go to the next level, the NFL, the more value you have to stay on the field with other things besides running back, it just makes you more valuable and appreciated as a player,’’ Price said of his ability to return kicks, setting him apart from some other running backs in the draft. “So, I think it does help me.”

Negatives on Price are that he can be fumble-prone and is limited as a receiver. He caught just six passes for 87 yards in 2025, although he did have two of his 13 overall touchdowns through the air.

If the Broncos don’t take a running back high in the draft, options later on could include Johnson and Coleman. Johnson ran for 1,451 yards in 2025 while catching 46 passes for 370 yards. Coleman, after rushing for 1,053 yards in 2024, had 758 in 2025 and caught 31 passes for 354 yards.

“Coach, Payton, man, he’s a great guy,’’ Johnson said about his Denver meeting. “Really nonchalant guy. And I learned a lot just in a short amount of time. … I think I like the fact that they were quizzing me with questions that I already knew the answers to. So, it was great.”

Coleman also claimed to have answered questions well from the Broncos.

“We just talked about pass protection, and I killed it,’’ he said. “I was pretty much answering the questions before they would ask me. So, I went in the room and they pretty much broke everything down, like, this is how we teach our pass protection. … (We) just ran through some of my tape and asked me to call out the runs that I was running. And I was able to do that because they run a similar offense (to what Coleman did at Washington).”

Price said a number of teams in combine interviews wanted to know why he didn’t leave Notre Dame to “go somewhere else and want to be a feature back.”

“I just tell them, ‘Notre Dame was the place for me,’’’ he said. “And they ultimately, at the end, they’re like, ‘We do respect that. We’re glad you made that decision.’”

As it turned out, Price still became the draft’s second-rated back after Love. And he said the Broncos like him.