Bryce Love was the clear Heisman runner-up behind Baker Mayfield in 2017. Here is why the returning Stanford running back will win the trophy in 2018.
In 2017, Bryce Love finally got his opportunity to take over feature duties at running back for Stanford. After emerging from Christian McCaffrey’s shadow, Love blew up as the most dominant Power Five back in the country. While Saquon Barkley got more hype, Love blew his rushing numbers out of the water.
Love’s 19 rushing touchdowns ranked fifth nationally. The Stanford back finished with over 2,100 rushing yards, ranking behind only San Diego State’s Rashaad Penny in ground production. While he wasn’t as dynamic in the passing game, Love was the catalyst that drove Stanford to the Pac-12 North title.
The most impressive part, though, is that Love continued to put up big numbers even as he suffered through nagging injuries. If he can stay healthy in 2018, Stanford may finally break through for its first Heisman Trophy since Jim Plunkett snatched the award in 1970.
After coping with the oh-so-close pain of seeing a slew of runner-up performances since Plunkett’s victory, Stanford is ready to break their streak of Heisman misses. With the Cardinal looking to contend in the Pac-12 race once again, Love will remain on the minds of Heisman voters all the way to the dais of the Downtown Athletic Club in December.
5. Love will put up improved receiving numbers
Last season, Bryce Love caught just six passes for 33 yards. When it came to the aerial attack, Stanford’s feature back was rarely featured. The year before that, when he was a sophomore backing up Christian McCaffrey, Love caught eight passes for 83 yards and a touchdown.
Love’s most productive season in the passing game came as a freshman, when he caught 15 passes for 250 yards and a score. Unlike McCaffrey, who was featured heavily as a dual-threat back, Love was utilized almost exclusively as a runner in the Cardinal offense.
Compared to someone like Saquon Barkley, Love was effectively nonexistent as a receiver in 2017. Even Rashaad Penny got more work through the air. But with KJ Costello becoming more comfortable as the starting quarterback, Love could get more work catching the ball out of the backfield. Stanford’s offensive catalyst doesn’t need to catch the 54 balls that Barkley hauled in last year to be effective.
Even if he only replicates the production of his freshman season, it would bolster Love’s offensive numbers for the Heisman discussion. A few touchdowns through the air certainly wouldn’t hurt either, but ultimately Love’s scoring prowess will be showcased most frequently the way he knows best.
4. He will score at least 20 rushing touchdowns
Last year, Bryce Love scored 19 touchdowns on the ground. It was the highest number of rushing touchdowns by a Cardinal running back since Tyler Gaffney posted 21 scores on the ground in 2013. Amazingly, it was also six more than the highest single-season total posted on the ground by Christian McCaffrey, the runner Love replaced in the Stanford backfield.
And they were rarely small runs, either. Only four of Love’s 19 touchdown runs went for fewer than 10 yards. Conversely, 11 of the 19 began in the opponent’s half of the field. That trend is unlikely to change, meaning that there will be even more highlight-reel touchdown runs to dazzle Heisman voters.
This year Love will be gunning for Gaffney’s mark of 21 — as a starting point. Then it would be a shot at passing the 22 scores put up by Tommy Vardell in 1994. He could even challenge Toby Gerhart’s school record of 28 rushing touchdowns set in 2009.
As of now, those are the only three Stanford players who have ever rushed for at least 20 touchdowns in a single season. Love will undoubtedly join them this season, and could easily average at least two rushing touchdowns per game. That would push him further up the list for Heisman consideration.
3. Love lost a lot of competition from the 2017 Heisman field
Before we go any further, let’s pause for a moment and look at who Bryce Love was up against in the 2017 Heisman voting. Baker Mayfield, the only person to finish ahead of Love, is now with the Cleveland Browns after earning the first overall pick in the 2018 NFL Draft. Lamar Jackson, the 2016 Heisman winner, was drafted by Baltimore with the last pick in the first round.
Both Saquon Barkley and Rashaad Penny, Love’s closest competition in terms of running backs, have also both gone pro with the New York Giants and Seattle Seahawks respectively. The highest vote getter from the 2017 Heisman voting after Love is Jonathan Taylor from the Badgers. Wisconsin’s running back enters his sophomore year with big expectations, and could push Love to produce even bigger numbers.
Naturally, his biggest competition will come from whichever quarterback manages to emerge for a national contender. Who that might end up being, though, is uncertain at this moment. Perhaps Jake Fromm or Tua Tagovailoa will break out in their sophomore campaigns in the SEC. Maybe a veteran like Trace McSorley or Jake Browning breaks out for a big senior season. If McKenzie Milton helps engineer a second straight undefeated season at UCF, he could get votes as well.
But at this point, the field doesn’t automatically skew toward passers. Given Love’s skill set and room to grow as an all-around threat, he enters the 2018 campaign as the man to beat in the Heisman race.
2. He will keep Stanford in Pac-12 and national contention
The surest way to ensure a strong Heisman campaign is to play on a team that is high in the national polls and on a hot streak in the win column. Stanford has the benefit of entering 2018 as the defending Pac-12 North champions, and they played conference champion USC close in the title game rematch.
Funny enough, the Heisman campaign of Bryce Love could boil down to how well the defense rebuilds in 2018. David Shaw’s crew must cope with the loss of eight defensive starters from last year’s division champs. The Cardinal have traditionally featured strong defenses, though, and there is plenty of talent waiting in the wings for their chance to shine.
Love already showed last year how critical his contribution is to the Stanford effort. When he missed the Oregon State game to nurse his ankle injury, the Cardinal nearly coughed up an upset to the Beavers. Even in Corvallis, and even given Oregon State’s penchant for pulling off stunners, that would have been right up among their greatest heists ever.
It wasn’t meant to be, and a Stanford team that was supposed to be in transition instead pulled back atop the Pac-12 North. With its veteran offense leading the way, the Cardinal should have no trouble keeping pace with Washington in the North and threatening to win the Pac-12 outright in 2018.
1. Love will remain healthy on his Heisman path in 2018
There are several reasons why Bryce Love finished as the runner-up behind Baker Mayfield in the 2017 Heisman voting. Mayfield put up a transcendent season as a passer. And Heisman voters tend to regard quarterbacks in higher esteem than running backs, at least in the 21st century. Mayfield also managed to guide Oklahoma to the Big 12 title, a goal in which Love fell just short.
A big reason to keep in mind, also, is the fact that Love played much of the second half of the season with a balky ankle that kept him from maximizing his effectiveness on the field. He missed the Oregon State game entirely as the Cardinal struggled with the Pac-12 cellar dweller. And on his return to the field against Washington State, Love was shut down for his only sub-100-yard rushing performance of the season.
That isn’t going to happen this year. Every game will end in triple digits in rushing yards. More likely, we will be wondering whether Love can maintain a rushing average at or near 200 yards per game. Stanford’s dominant runner has proven capable of changing the complexion of any game with his ability to burst for long scoring runs.
As he angles to be the next highly-drafted running back to go from college to the pros, Love will have at least a dozen touchdowns of 50 or more yards, a feat he nearly pulled off in 2017. 2500 rushing yards will be well within reach as long as Love remains on the field. And if that happens, Stanford won’t be a runner-up in the Heisman race this time around.