The Alabama running back was presented with the coveted trophy at a televised awards ceremony in New York’s Playstation Theater. While we’ve seen a string of quarterbacks carry home the award in recent years, the presence of two running backs on the stage may just change that trend.
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Overall, McCaffrey finished a distant second while Watson checked in at third in the voting. “And if I happen to stay my senior year I want to be back then”, Watson said. In the same game, Alabama’s Henry thrashed LSU for 210 yards and three scores on 38 rushes, as the Tide came out on top 30-16.
Alabama running back Derrick Henry is newest member of one sport’s most elite fraternities after winning the Heisman Trophy Saturday night in NY.
Henry is the first running back to win the Heisman since Alabama’s Mark Ingram won in 2009.
Henry became the second Heisman Trophy victor in Alabama history, and the running back racked up 1,832 total points. His competition was Stanford’s rocket-fast punt returner Christian McCaffrey (1,539) and Clemson quarterback Deshaun Watson (1,165).
Henry had an awesome season, setting the all-time SEC single-season rushing record with 1,986 yards, breaking Herschel Walker’s record set in 1981. There’s no reason he shouldn’t win this award either. When I look at it, even objectively, and you can’t really dispute what I’m about to say, you could say he had the best year in the history of college football.
“This could not have been done without my teammates and our coaches”, Watson said. “All they did in high school was turn around and toss me the ball and I ran with it, ‘” Saban said. Interestingly, he’s just the third player from the state of Florida to win it.
Including the vacated 2005 award won by USC’s Reggie Bush, it also was the third time since 1999 a non-quarterback won the trophy.
Henry also led Alabama to a 12-1 record and a big SEC Championship victory over the Florida Gators last week. McCaffrey racked up 3,496 all-purpose yards on the season. Watson quarterbacked Clemson to a 13-0 record, the Atlantic Coast Conference championship and the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff while amassing 4,399 yards of total offense so far.
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Rashaan Salaam, Colorado, 1994: The junior ended the season with 2,349 yards from scrimmage (2,055 rushing) and ran for 24 scores for the Buffaloes, who beat Notre Dame 41-24 in the Fiesta Bowl to finish 11-1.
