Random Thought

Lots of blogging today... just a glimpse of what the regular season will be like.

I get the feeling UCLA's Maurice Drew is the next Darren Sproles.  Both are fast enough, bowling-ball type dwarf backs.  I remember his hype coming out of fabled Concord DeLaSalle high scool, and choosing UCLA over a host of schools including powerhouse USC.

Last year he went nuts against Washington, to the tune of 26 carries, 322 yards (12.4 YPC), and 5 touchdowns.  He scored on runs of 47, 52, 58, 15, and 37 yards.  It was an unbelievable performance, and there will be many more to come, especially given that his size may force him into being a 4-year player.

Anyway, he is one of the NCAA's most versatile backs/athletes.  His backup Chris Markey, another smurf, isn't bad either.

Check out these Drew sophomore year numbers---

• Rushing-150 carries, 1007 yards (5.3 YPC), 8 TD
• Receiving-18 Rec, 252 yards (14.5 Yd/Rec) 3 TD
• Passing-1/1 for 47 yards
• Punt Returns-10 for 152 yards (15.2 Avg) and 1 TD (58 yards)
• Kick Returns-7 for 185 yards (25.4 Avg)

More on the NCAA's most gifted versatile players, coming up...

Comments

[Jube]

The problem is that when you take out that nova-game, his numbers look rather mundane.

[CFR]

Good point. The skill is obvious, though. It looked like UCLA was finally figuring out how to utilize him all over the field early in the year and then got away from that.

[mgoblog]

and the nova-game was against this:

http://web1.ncaa.org/d1mfb/Internet/ranking_summary/2004000000756.HTML

bleah! The point's well made, though... those PR stats jump out at me. Those are Breastonian. (Michigan bias? Perhaps, but I couldn't make a clever word out of "Ginn").