Who Is Ollie Gordon?

By Seth Perlstein ‘27
This year in college football, many star quarterbacks, including Michael Penix Jr., Jayden Daniels and Bo Nix, have put up legendary stats. However, a new underrated player has risen through the ranks: an outstanding running back at Oklahoma State named Ollie Gordon. 

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Ollie Gordon is a 6’1” sophomore running back from Fort Worth, Texas. He is having one of the best seasons in the past 25 years for any college running back. 
Ollie Gordon has the most rushing yards in Division I with 1,614 and has the second-most rushing touchdowns. He averages 6.3 yards per carry on 258 carries this season. A showcase of Ollie’s role and performance was when Oklahoma State was down 24-6 to BYU when he went on to score four touchdowns in the next two quarters and five touchdowns overall to help the Cowboys win 40-34. Also, in the prior game against Houston, Oklahoma State was down 23-9 when Ollie Gordon scored 21 of their next 34 points to lead them to a 43-30 victory.
Ollie Gordon has had six games where he ran for over 100 yards and two more with over 200 yards, where he had played teams in the Big 12. He has four games with multiple rushing touchdowns and has scored almost 50% of the team’s touchdowns this season. In three of the four games that Oklahoma State lost, Ollie Gordon had less than 40 yards. This further demonstrates how vital Ollie Gordon is to Oklahoma State and how he has such an important role in the team’s success.  
There is only one season in recent history when someone put up comparable stats: Derrick Henry’s 2015 Heisman season. In 13 games, Derrick Henry had 1,986 yards on 339 carries (5.86 yards per carry) and 25 rushing touchdowns. 
If Ollie Gordon benefitted from the same amount of carries, based upon 6.3 yards per carry, he would have had 2,136 total yards, which is 150 more than Henry’s Heisman season. Despite his electrifying season and statistics he still wasn’t nominated for the Heisman award and lost in the race to players Jayden Daniels, Bo Nix, Marvin Harrison Jr. and Michael Penix Jr. 

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