Football Preview: Running Backs

Once Hartline found his rhythm last season and Derrick Locke got injured with a shoulder problem for awhile we ended up relying heavily on our passing game to make progress a lot of the time. With a new quarterback taking over in Newton and until he really proves himself in a game I think it is safe to say that especially at first we will probably try to rely a lot on our rushing ability. Depending on how Newton turns out and how good his passing ability is this season there is the potential we may even have to rely on our rushing ability more than last season. The big question though is how good will our rushing game be this year?

It is no secret that last year Derrick Locke was our rushing game. Of the 2335 yards gained last season, Locke ran for 919 of those with Cobb coming in second at 446. If you do the math that means that Locke alone was 39% of our yards from rushing and when you add him and Cobb together it means that 58% of our rushing yards came from two guys that are not on the roster this year. As far as touchdowns go, Locke had 10 of the 26 total rushing TDs and Cobb had 5, together accounting for about 58% of our rushing TDs.

Our #1 runner this year is Raymond Sanders, a sophomore who was fourth on rushing last year behind Donald Russell who you may recall was a promising player but was overlooked by Coach Phillips and ended up transferring from the program to Georgia State. Sanders had 297 yards and accounted for 3 of our 26 rushing TDs. Behind him on the depth chart is Josh Clemons a 3 star Scout/Rivals player from Fayetteville, Georgia. According to Scout.com he had 2,003 yards and 25 TDs as a senior. The third runner on the depth chart this year will be CoShik Williams, a junior who ran for 140 yards and 4 TDs last season.

So, where does this leave us this season as far as rushing? Stats-wise you never like to see that over 50% of your rushing yards and TDs came from players that aren't on your roster this year and that the ones who have came back account for only 7 of the 26 or 27% from last season but as we all know, when you are eclipsed by another player you don't always get to show your true potential and with Randers being THE guy this year and having a year under his belt as well as the addition of freshman players like Clemons that are outperforming player that have been here awhile there is certainly the potential for things to turn out well.

At this point all we can do on is what the coaches have seen in practice this summer. Sanders knows he has a big void to fill and the coaches are impressed with how Clemons looks and Williams has improved but how well that all translates onto the field is another matter. Overall I look for us to do okay on rushing this year but nothing stellar. I think as we all have surmised that this season in large part succeeds or fails based on Newton and his ability to connect with the WRs and their ability to hold onto the ball. I think we will also see some running from Newton as well and gain some ground yardage out of him.