SMQ: Stanford finishes runner-up in Heisman voting for sixth time in history
By Zach Bigalke
6 runner-up finishes
- SCHOOLS (1): Stanford
- MOST HEISMAN WINS: Stanford, 1
- SCHOOLS THAT HAVEN’T WON (0)
- MOST TOP-3 FINISHES: Stanford, 9
And then there was just one. Baker Mayfield was never going to leave Manhattan without the Heisman in his grasp. That left the battle for second place as the biggest question coming into Saturday night’s award ceremony.
Would Louisville get a second straight top-two finish after Lamar Jackson won last year? Or would Stanford pass Oklahoma as the team with more close calls than any other in the history of the Heisman award?
Ultimately it became academic. Bryce Love finished more than 500 points ahead of third-place Jackson, and more than 1000 points behind Mayfield’s winning vote total. While Stanford has won the award once, there is an increasing amount of distance between Jim Plunkett’s 1970 Heisman and the Cardinal players that have just barely failed to join Plunkett as winners from the school.
John Elway finished second behind Herschel Walker of Georgia back in 1982. More than a quarter-century after Elway fell just short, Toby Gerhart narrowly lost the closest Heisman vote in history to Alabama’s Mark Ingram. The final margin of defeat was 28 points in the voting, even though Ingram carried five of six regions.
That set off a three-year run where Stanford finished second in the Heisman race. After Gerhart, quarterback Andrew Luck came up short in both 2010 and 2011. All-purpose back Christian McCaffrey came close in 2015, losing out to an Alabama back just like Gerhart. Derrick Henry finished less than 300 points ahead in another close vote.
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Time time around, Love put in a phenomenal season as McCaffrey’s replacement in the backfield. But Mayfield simply had an otherworldly season in Norman and wasn’t going to be beat.