The countdown to the 2018 Oklahoma football season has now reached single digits, at eight days.
The two major weekly polls have come out with their preseason top 25 teams and the preseason conference predictions, as well as the preseason national award watch lists and All-America First Team selections, have been revealed.
On Friday, ESPN released its initial watch list for college football most prestigious individual award, the Heisman Trophy.
Oklahoma has had six Heisman winners in its history, including the reigning Heisman honoree, Baker Mayfield. Since 2003, three Oklahoma quarterbacks (Jason White, Sam Bradford and Mayfield) have won college football’s top individual award. Only two schools have more Heisman winners than OU. Notre Dame and Ohio State both have won seven.
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Running back Bryce Love of Stanford is the heavy preseason favorite to win the 2018 Heisman, with Jonathan Taylor, a running back for Wisconsin, defensive tackle Ed Oliver of Houston, West Virginia quarterback Will Grier and Arizona quarterback Kahlil Tate rounding out the top five on ESPN’s initial Heisman watch list.
The list is fluid and will be updated throughout the season, based on the individual performances as the schedule progresses.
Fourteen players received Heisman votes in the ESPN Experts’ Poll published on Friday. One of those was Oklahoma running back Rodney Anderson, who led the Sooners in rushing last season with 1,161 yards and 13 rushing touchdowns, most all of which came over the final eight games of the season. Over the final eight games of the season, no Power Five player gained more yards on the ground than Anderson, who capped off the 2017 season with a 201-yard performance against a top-10-ranked Georgia defense in the College Football Playoff.
Anderson was also dangerous catching passes out of the backfield last season with 17 receptions for 281 yards and five receiving touchdowns.
Mayfield was a Heisman finalist all three years he was the OU starting quarterback, and in 2016, he was joined by teammate Dede Westbrook as one of the five Heisman finalists. In 2004, the year after Jason White won the Heisman, both White and then OU freshman Adrian Peterson were finalists for the award, and Peterson finished second in the voting to USC’s Matt Leinart.