Photo by: Allen Gambrell
Breida Added to Doak Walker Award Candidates List
11/17/2014 1:53:00 PM | Football
Sophomore running back leads nation with 9.43 yards per carry
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DALLAS – Georgia Southern running back Matt Breida was added to the list of candidates for the 2014 Doak Walker Award. The prestigious national honor, named for Heisman Trophy winner and three-time All-American Doak Walker, was created in 1989 to recognize the nation's premier running back for his accomplishments on the field, achievement in the classroom and citizenship in the community. Breida, who has the best per-carry average in the nation at 9.43 yards per attempt, leads the Eagles and the Sun Belt Conference in rushing with 130.4 yards per game average and scoring (102 points). He has a cumulative grade point average of 3.0 and is planning on majoring in business.
The sophomore from Brooksville, Fla., and Nature Coast Technical High School has recorded two games with 200 or more yards rushing with seven games with 100 or more yards on the ground. On the 2014 season, Breida has 1,434 total, good for fourth nationally and is currently ninth on Georgia Southern's single-season chart.
Breida's 16 rushing touchdowns are the most in the Sun Belt Conference and put him in a tie for seventh nationally. He has six games with multiple touchdowns and he leads the nation with seven touchdowns of 50 or more yards each. Breida's 88-yard touchdown at Navy Saturday is the third-longest rushing TD in Georgia Southern history.
Doak Walker, who in addition to being a running back, punted, returned punts and kickoffs and kicked extra points, epitomized leadership, sportsmanship, and academic and athletic achievement during his storied career at Southern Methodist University in the late 1940s. Walker was a three-time All-American who started as a freshman at SMU. He was the first junior to receive the Heisman Trophy and won the Maxwell Trophy as a sophomore. His collegiate playing career was interrupted by his a year of service in the U.S. Army.
He later played for the Detroit Lions and led the NFL in scoring as a rookie in 1950. A 1959 inductee to the College Football Hall of Fame and member of the 1986 Pro Football Hall of Fame, he was honored to have his number 37 jersey retired by SMU prior to the 2000 season.
Georgia Southern Athletics provides up-to-date information on all its sports through its official website, GSEagles.com, through social media channels facebook.com/GSAthletics, twitter.com/GSAthletics, iOS app Georgia Southern Eagles and Android app Eagles GATA. Fans can follow Coach Willie Fritz on his official twitter account, @CoachWEFritz.
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