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Sports Watch
OVER the years, Hawaii fans have had the fortune -- maybe it should be misfortune -- of seeing some of college football's greatest running backs. Top backs give
UH the runaroundTerry Metcalf, Charles White, Marcus Allen, Mike Rozier, Marshall Faulk, Ricky Williams and Ron Dayne -- the latter two setting NCAA rushing records in career yards, a lot of it at UH's expense.
Both Metcalf (Long Beach State) and Faulk (San Diego State), now with the Super Bowl champion St. Louis Rams, both scored five touchdowns against the Rainbows -- still an opponent record.
Williams began his eventual Heisman-winning career against Hawaii as a freshman running back for Texas.
He ran for the first 95 of his then NCAA-record setting 6,279 career yards against the Rainbows in their 1995 season opener at Aloha Stadium.
Williams lost his record number to Dayne, who went on to win the Heisman Trophy as well. Like Williams, Dayne was a freshman when Wisconsin played against Hawaii in the 1996 season finale.
Dayne rushed for a UH opponent record 339 yards -- despite sitting out the fourth quarter -- en route to his career 6,327 total to surpass Williams.
Imagine. College football's one-two all-time rushers launched their careers here.
And, if that's not impressive enough, White (USC), Rozier (Nebraska) and Faulk (San Diego State) also hold their school rushing records.
We've seen 'em all here. But that's not all.
Five of the eight running backs considered for the 2000 Doak Walker Award also played against Hawaii:
LaDainian Tomlinson (Texas Christian), Deonce Whitaker (San Jose State), Ken Simonton (Oregon State), Damien Anderson (Northwestern) and Anthony Thomas (Michigan).
Tomlinson ran for 294 yards and four touchdowns against UH on Oct. 7.
Already TCU's all-time rusher, "L.T." holds the NCAA single-game record of 406 yards against Texas-El Paso last year.
With 4,779 yards, Tomlinson, who started the season 14th all-time among WAC rushers, has already surpassed Faulk, who was No. 2 with 4,589 yards, and needs only 35 yards to overtake Colorado State's Steve Bartalo, No. 1 at 4,813.
Whitaker, who ran for a career-high 278 yards against UH Oct. 28, has already set the Spartans' season and career rushing records with two games remaining.
SIMONTON, the Pac-10's leading rusher with 1,361 yards, scored twice and ran for 157 yards in the 23-17 loss to Hawaii in the 1999 Oahu Bowl.
With seven 100-yard games this season, Simonton is only the second back in Pac-10 history to run for 1,000 yards in each of his first three seasons. A junior, he'll be back for an encore.
The nation's leading rusher with 1,735 yards, Anderson was a sophomore when he ran for a modest 57 yards on 18 carries against UH in 1998 when Northwestern won, 47-21.
The following week that season, Anthony Thomas ran 13 times for 183 yards and four touchdowns in Michigan's 48-17 victory over Hawaii.
Since then, the "A Train" has set the school's touchdown record and, with 4,228 yards, is only 165 yards from breaking the Wolverine career rushing mark held by Jamie Morris with two games left.
Perhaps we ain't seen nothing yet. Next week, Wisconsin comes to town with speedster Michael Bennett, who ran for 293 yards against Northwestern and 290 against Oregon.
A junior, Bennett could be the premier running back in the nation next season.
What a treat. Well, maybe not for the UH defense.
Bill Kwon has been writing about
sports for the Star-Bulletin since 1959.