Three football Hurricanes make state-college Top 10, but who’s that guy sitting at No. 1?
Miami Hurricanes running back Mark Walton and quarterback Malik Rosier take third and fourth place in the Herald’s first State Offensive Player of the Year (SOPY) rankings of the 2017 college football season.
Two FIU Panthers, Alex McGough and Thomas Owens , also make the Week 1 Top 10, while UCF QB McKenzie Milton clasims the overrall No.1 spot ahead of defending champion Quinton Flowers of the South Florida Bulls (and Miami Jackson High).
Our weekly rankings measure the most productive quarterbacks, running backs and receivers for the state's seven top-level FBS teams: Miami, Florida, Florida State, FIU, FAU, UCF and South Florida. The rankings are cumulative but based on average yards per game: Total yards divided by number of games a player's team has played. This keeps the comparison level even though not all teams have played same number of games. (Even now, South Florida already has played twice).
Our simple formula awards a half-point for every passing yard and one point for every rushing or receiving yard, with six points for every TD scored or thrown.
The SOPY rankings are in their sixth season in our Random Evidence blog but are now appearing elsewhere at MiamiHerald.com Sports for the first time.
2017 SOPY WEEK 1 TOP 10
RK Player, School-Pos. Avg.
1 McKenzie Milton-UCF qb 208
2 Quinton Flowers-SoFla qb 183
3 Mark Walton-Miami rb 168
4 Malik Rosier-Miami qb 167.5
5 Daniel Parr-FAU qb 138.5
6 Travis Homer-Miami rb 133
7 Alex McGough-FIU qb 107.5
8 Thomas Owens- FIU rec 105
9 Deondre Francois-FSU qb 102
10t Dredrick Snelson-UCF rec 98
10t Willie Wright-FAU rec 98
Bubble: DeAndre McNeal-FAU rec, 94. Other team leader: Florida--Josh Hammond-rec, 71. Week 1/season best: Milton-UCF, 208 points.
Cote's State of the State rankings: 1. Florida State (0-1); 2. Miami (1-0); 3. South Florida (2-0); 4. Florida (0-1); 5. UCF (1-0); 6. FAU (0-1); 7. FIU (0-1).
Roll Call of SOPY Champions: 2016—Quinton Flowers, SoFla-qb, 2,917 total points. 2015—Flowers, 2,077.5. 2014—Duke Johnson, Miami-rb, 1,968. 2013—Jameis Winston, FSU-qb, 2,107. 2012—Stephen Morris, Miami-qb, 1,900.5.
This story was originally published September 5, 2017 at 3:07 PM with the headline "Three football Hurricanes make state-college Top 10, but who’s that guy sitting at No. 1?."