What do Adrian Peterson, Steve Slaton, Michael Hart, Antonio Pittman, Marshawn Lynch, and Kenny Irons have in common?
That's easy-all are starting running backs for top 25 teams and possible Heisman contenders.
Here's a tougher one: which of these six running backs is leading the nation in rushing?
None of them. The leading rusher in Div. I is the Northern Illinois Huskies' running back, senior Garrett Wolfe.
Garrett who?
At 5'7" and 177 pounds, Wolfe looks more like a kicker than a running back. However, after Saturday's performance against the Ball State Cardinals, a game in which Wolfe finished with an eye-popping 353 yards rushing, he now has an excellent chance at breaking the all-time NCAA single-season rushing mark.
In only five games this season, Wolfe has rushed for 1,146 yards. That's a season for several good running backs, but Wolfe still has seven games left. He is averaging a staggering 229.2 yards rushing per game, and if he keeps up this pace, Wolfe will surpass 2,750 yards for the year.
To get a better appreciation, compare these statistics to the current NCAA single-season record, held by none other than former Detroit Lions great Barry Sanders. In 1988, Sanders averaged 238.9 yards a game in 11 games at Oklahoma State to finish the
season with 2,628 yards. Though Wolfe has an extra game to break the record, there is the definite possibility that he could do so in his 11th game, as Sanders did, and avoid any controversy.
However, one debate that Wolfe cannot avoid is whether he's worthy of the national spotlight. The major knock against him is that he faces weaker opponents. Northern Illinois plays in the Mid-American Conference, and therefore does not see top-quality opposition week-in and week-out that other Heisman Trophy candidates do.
While the MAC in recent years has grown stronger and has been the training grounds for NFL quarterbacks such as Ben Roethlisberger, Byron Leftwich and Chad Pennington, it is still considered a mid-major conference. This has definitely been a disadvantage in the Heisman balloting. The last time a player from a non-BCS conference won the Heisman was in 1990, when Ty Detmer set the NCAA single season record for passing yards with 5,188 while playing at BYU.
This is the type of uphill battle that Wolfe now faces if he were to seriously contend for the Heisman. Strengthening his case, Wolfe has gone out and destroyed the easy competition by running for 196, 263, 198, and 353 yards in four games this season.
On top of that, when Wolfe gets a chance to play against ranked teams, he does not disappoint. In the 2005 season opener against the No. 4 Michigan Wolverines, Wolfe ran for 148 yards and a touchdown on only 17 carries. In this year's season opener against Ohio State, he scampered for 171 yards rushing on 26 carries and another 114 yards from five receptions. That's 285 total yards against the No. 1 team in the nation.
Rarely has the nation seen an individual player torch the top-ranked team for so many yards. The most recent player that comes to mind is Vince Young of the Texas Longhorns. Though he was a quarterback, he made every defensive coordinator quiver when he took off from the pocket. In the 2005 season, Young may have had the greatest individual game in BCS championship history against then-No. 1 USC.
His personal box score was downright scary. Young was 30 of 40 for 267 yards passing with another 200 yards rushing on just 19 carries for a total of 467 yards. That alone should have won him the Heisman, except it came a month after the balloting ended and the award had already been handed out to his opponent from that night, USC tailback Reggie Bush.
Young averaged 7.91 yards per touch that night against the two-time defending national champions. But even that number seems pedestrian in comparison to Wolfe' showing against Ohio State. He averaged a mind-boggling 9.19 yards per touch, and interestingly, his opponent that night was none other than this season's early Heisman favorite, Buckeye quarterback Troy Smith.
Smith has the elite talent, the top schedule, and an excellent supporting cast-a combination which, barring a meltdown, should lead him to the Heisman banquet in New York City in December. However, sitting next to him should be Wolfe.
So back to the big question: who's afraid of the big bad Wolfe?
It's not Troy Smith, Adrian Peterson, Brady Quinn, and any other legitimate Heisman candidate, but rather the Heisman voters, who could be faced with denying the NCAA's all-time single season rushing leader the award that he deserves.
