Notre Dame football RB Jeremiyah Love misses out on Heisman Trophy
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NEW YORK — The Heisman Trophy drought continues for Notre Dame football.
All-America running back Jeremiyah Love lost out to winner Fernando Mendoza, the quarterback of top-ranked Indiana, in voting announced Saturday night, Dec. 13. Love finished third with 719 points, well behind Mendoza’s 2,362 points and runner-up Diego Pavia of Vanderbilt (1,435).
Ohio State quarterback Julian Sayin finished fourth with 432 points.
Mendoza received 643 first-place votes, Pavia 189 and Love 46.
Wide receiver/returner Tim Brown was the seventh and most recent Notre Dame winner of the Heisman in 1987. One of four finalists in attendance, Love is the first Irish player to earn that distinction since linebacker Manti Te’o was the runner-up in 2012.
No running back has won the Heisman since Alabama’s Derrick Henry in 2015.
Named the Doak Walker Award winner on Friday night as college football’s top running back, Love broke Jerome Bettis’ 34-year-old school record for touchdowns in a season with 21. Love was the first Notre Dame player to win the Doak Walker Award since it was established in 1990.
The record-setting junior from St. Louis was joined by 10 family members at Saturday’s ceremony at Jazz at the Lincoln Center, including his five siblings and their parents, Jason and L’Tyona Love.
“There’s definitely a chance I could come out of this disappointed,” Love said Saturday before the ceremony. “I want to win the Heisman. I put in a lot of work this season and I feel like the plays that I’ve made this season, I’m Heisman-worthy.
“Now, I’m not going to necessarily be completely bummed out about it. If I don’t win, it’s OK. But some disappointment is going to come with it. I feel like that’s natural. I’m a competitor and I want to win in everything that I do. And I want to be recognized for some of the great things I’ve done this season.”
Record-setting year ends shy of Heisman Trophy
Love finished with 1,652 yards from scrimmage, including 1,372 rushing, while sharing time with fourth-year running back Jadarian Price. Love averaged 7.3 yards per touch this season and piled up 40 total touchdowns over the past two seasons.
Just two other Irish running backs have finished in the top 10 of Heisman voting since Vagas Ferguson finished fifth in 1979. Allen Pinkett was eighth in 1985 and Reggie Brooks was fifth in 1992.
“I’ve already been recognized by winning the Doak Walker Award, but I feel like the Heisman Trophy is the highest and the best honor you could have in college football,” Love said. “If I am to win it, if I’m not, I’ll be OK with it. But a competitor is going to be disappointed if they don’t win. They’re going to be a little down. I’m hoping for the best, not only for myself but those (fellow finalists) as well.”
Love’s 1,372 rushing yards rank fourth in the country and his 18 rushing touchdowns rank third. His 6.89-yard per-carry average leads all players with at least 1,050 rushing yards this year.
A gifted receiver as well, Love had 27 catches for 280 yards and three scores.
Notre Dame’s Heisman winners before Brown were quarterback John Huarte (1964), quarterback Paul Hornung (1956), halfback John Lattner (1953), end Leon Hart (1949), quarterback John Lujack (1947) and quarterback Angelo Bertelli (1943).
Including the seven winners, Irish players have now finished in the top five of Heisman voting 30 times in the award’s history.
This year’s voting was remarkably similar by region with the final four finishing in that order in all six geographic locales. Love’s top region was the Northeast (132 points), followed by the Midwest (127), Mid-Atlantic (122), Southwest (114), South (113) and Far West (111).
Mendoza, the first Cuban-American Heisman winner, takes his place in Notre Dame lore as the winner in years that marked top-three finishes for Irish stars. Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel outpolled Te’o by just 323 points in 2012 with a first-place voting edge of 474-321.
Irish quarterback Brady Quinn finished third in 2006 behind Ohio State quarterback Troy Smith. In 1990, Irish all-purpose threat Raghib Ismail finished second to Brigham Young quarterback Ty Detmer; the winning margin was 305 points with Detmer’s first-place voting edge 316-237.
Tight end Ken MacAfee finished third behind Texas’ Earl Campbell in 1977. Quarterback Joe Theismann was runner-up to Stanford quarterback Jim Plunkett in 1970 by a margin of 819 points.
In the prior decade, quarterback Terry Hanratty finished third behind USC’s O.J. Simpson (1968) and running back Nick Eddy was third behind Florida quarterback Steve Spurrier (1966).
Future winners Johnny Lujack (1946) and Angelo Bertelli (1941) finished third and second, respectively, behind Army’s Glenn Davis and Minnesota’s Bruce Smith in those years.
Irish halfback Bill Shakespeare finished third to University of Chicago running back Jay Berwanger in 1935, the Heisman’s inaugural year.
Mike Berardino covers Notre Dame football for the South Bend Tribune and NDInsider.com. Follow him on social media @MikeBerardino.
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Notre Dame football’s Jeremiyah Love falls short of Heisman Trophy
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