Boston College Football: Preseason Award Watchlist Candidates
In the coming months, the preseason watchlists for college football's national awards should be release. These watchlists are typically quite generous and lengthy, giving players for the smallest schools a slight chance at glory. Regardless, Boston College has quite a few talented players that should see their names appear on these lists. Let's take a look at these awards and BC's players' cases for them:
Maxwell, Walter Camp, and Lombardi Awards (Outstanding Offensive Player)
Phil Jurkovec and Zay Flowers
The first two awards on this list are traditionally presented to the nation’s most outstanding offensive player. The third was previously limited to linemen and linebackers but recently expanded to all players. Both Phil Jurkovec and Zay Flowers should be on the preseason watchlists for these awards. I’ll delve into their individual cases more in the positional awards.
Davey O’Brien Award and Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award (Best Quarterback Awards)
Phil Jurkovec
Obviously, the Eagles’ signal-caller should make an appearance on both of these watchlists. Jurkovec came to BC last with a decent amount of fanfare and proceeded to far surpass his expectations. With a combination of his strong arm, athleticism, and toughness, he went 6-4 as a starter, with two losses coming at the hand of teams that made the College Football Playoff. In 10 games, he threw 17 touchdowns against only 5 interceptions. Jurkovec is poised to take a big leap forward, with nearly the entire offense returning for the 2021 season. If he can continue the development he showed towards the end of last season by cleaning up some mechanical issues and making some better decisions, Jurkovec could contend for not only being the best quarterback in the ACC but in all of college football.
Fred Biletnikoff Award (Best Wide Receiver)
Zay Flowers
Frankly, this should be the most obvious selection. Flowers exploded onto the scene last year with breakout games against Duke and Pittsburgh. He continued to make highlight plays throughout the season, whether it be torching defensive backs on deep routes, or displaying his elite agility and athleticism in the open field after the catch. Obviously, the crop of talented wide receivers in college football is massive again this year. But if everything goes right for the BC offense, and Flowers can clean up some of his issues with drops, he could be a shoo-in for the award.
Paul Hornung Award (Most Versatile Player)
Zay Flowers and Travis Levy
Flowers may not earn a spot on the initial watchlist but could generate some buzz as the season goes on. In addition to being an elite receiver, Flowers has displayed the ability to contribute in the run game on jet sweeps, reverses, and end arounds. However, in order to challenge for the Hornung Award, Flowers may need to steal one or both of the returner jobs. Given his status as the number one wide receiver, that seems unlikely. This brings us to the other player, Travis Levy. Levy reminds me of the player to wear his number previously, Myles Willis. A smaller, quicker running back, Levy contributes the most as a third down, receiving back option; he also returns kicks and punts and has played on special teams for nearly his whole career. This career may be enough to get him on the watchlist. However, in order to truly contend, Levy has to lock down the primary running back job, in order to gain enough rushing yards to be in contention. That seems relatively unlikely, given the current depth and youth at the position. Nevertheless, his accomplishments to date could get him a spot on the preseason watchlist.
John Mackey Award (Best Tight End)
Trae Barry
In any other season, BC would be looking to have repeat winners of the Mackey Award. Had Hunter Long not been going up against Kyle Pitts last season, he surely would have taken home the award after leading all tight ends in college football in targets and receptions. But, as it stands, Trae Barry will need to stand alone. An FCS All-American at Jacksonville State, Barry transferred to BC to get more NFL eyes on him; the pedigree of getting tight ends to the NFL was surely one of his primary motivators for heading up north. Barry will need to at least equal, and probably surpass, Long’s numbers from last season in order to win this award. But his potential should get him a spot on the watchlist at the very least.
Offensive Line Awards: Joe Moore Award (best offensive line as a group), Outland Trophy (outstanding offensive lineman), Rimington Trophy (best center), Lombardi Award (nation’s best player, ideally a lineman).
Tyler Vrabel, Zion Johnson, Alec Lindstrom, Christian Mahogany, and Ben Petrula
Among certain circles on Twitter, the Joe Moore Award may be the most coveted award in college football. It’s one of, if not, the only award given to an entire group of players. Since 2014, this offensive line might be BC’s best shot to win this award. With three graduate students and five returning starters (albeit in different positions for some), this offensive line is extremely experienced. Additionally, this will be their second season in the new offensive system, for which they’ve had an entire normal offseason to learn it. Therefore, even considering the position changes (which should be helpful more than anything), this offensive line should be among the best in college football. In terms of individual awards, Lindstrom should be among the betting favorites to win the Rimington Trophy, as he is coming off a 1st-Team All-ACC season. I would think Zion Johnson would be the favorite to win the Outland among this group, as it traditionally goes to interior offensive linemen, and Johnson is returning to his natural position of left guard, where he is much more suited to succeed. While Vrabel is the more intriguing prospect for the NFL, Petrula returns for his fourth consecutive year as a starter.
Chuck Bednarik Award and Bronko Nagurski Award (Best Defensive Player)
Deon Jones, Chibueze Onwuka, Jaiden Lars-Woodbey, Marcus Valdez, Brandon Sebastian
The Bednarik Award has been more willing to pick DBs in the past, whereas the Nagurski Award has typically focused on front seven players. Therefore, keep an eye on Deon Jones for the Bednarik; the coaching staff loves him and he might be BC’s most talented defensive back. If he can stay healthy, he could be a semifinalist for this award. If JLW stays healthy as well, and he meshes with the new defense as well as the coaching staff thinks he will, he could be a major impact defender. This defense could give him a lot of opportunities to make plays, and racking up stats is a great way to catch the attention of awards committees.
On the defensive line, keep an eye on Chibueze Onwuka and Marcus Valdez. To this point, neither have been stat padders where it counts. But Onwuka made lots of plays and should be even better this year; Valdez has been a PFF darling, but he needs to translate that into pressures and sacks. Onwuka is more likely to end up on the watchlist, but honestly, both are long shots.
Jim Thorpe Award (Best Defensive Back)
Brandon Sebastian, Deon Jones, Jaiden Lars-Woodbey, Jahmin Muse, Josh DeBerry
Yeah, just put the whole secondary on there. Like the offensive line, this group is extremely experienced and is poised to get even better. Sebastian has flown under the radar as a very solid player, which is exactly what you want from your number one cornerback. The rest of the names on this list are more of the playmaking types: Muse and Lars-Woodbey should form a dynamic tandem playing in the box and overhang areas, while DeBerry made some crazy plays in limited duty last year. In order to take home the Thorpe, you have to forced turnovers. If any of these players can be near the top of the interceptions leaderboard, they could take home the award.
Frank Broyles Award (Best Coordinator/Assistant Coach)
Tem Lukabu
While a lot of the focus of this offseason has been directed toward the offense (Can Jurko take the next step? Who replaces Hunter Long and David Bailey?), the defense is quietly shaping up to be an extremely interesting unit. Multiple coaches have talked about how they want to expand the playbook and challenge the players with more complex schemes this year. Obviously, Jeff Hafley is a major part of putting the defense together. But if this defense can create some shades of the 2015 BC defense under Don Brown, Tem Lukabu might get some hardware. If the offense is humming and putting up points, Lukabu might be able to take some more risks with his defense, which could pay great dividends.
The Home Depot Award (Best Head Coach)
Jeff Hafley
After looking over the schedule again, I think there is a legitimate shot BC can go 11-1 this season. Much has been made about the lack of strength under Clemson in the ACC. Therefore, this is BC’s time to strike. I don’t think they can beat Clemson; I know it was close last year and Clemson probably got worse. But they’re still loaded with talent that BC could never even sniff. However, the rest of the schedule looks very manageable. Virginia Tech gives me some pause, but I think they’re down like the rest of the conference.
If Hafley can pull off a one-loss season, with his lone defeat coming at an ostensibly undefeated top-three program in college football, I think it would be a shame if he didn’t get some love for coach of the year. Unless something even crazier happens (i.e. Kansas goes undefeated), a New Years Six bowl berth could win Hafley some awards.
Heisman Trophy
Phil Jurkovec and Zay Flowers
Now onto the really hot takes. Honestly, putting Zay on this list is pretty unfair. If he has a Heisman-worthy season, then Jurkovec did as well. Furthermore, Flowers would have to surpass the season of the current Heisman winner, DeVonta Smith, another wide receiver. Smith became the first wide receiver to win the award in almost thirty years; going back to back at that position would be next to impossible.
Returning to Jurkovec, in order to be in consideration for this award, BC would probably need to have that 11-1 season mentioned in the previous paragraph. The Heisman is more about the best player on the best team than the player himself. But as college football has lost some of its most recognizable faces (Trevor Lawrence, Justin Fields, etc.), there seems to be a vacuum, one that Jurkovec could take advantage of.