Smith-Marsette Named To Biletnikoff Award Preseason List

Iowa wide receiver among players up for honor.

Iowa senior wide receiver Ihmir Smith-Marsette was named to the 2020 Biletnikoff Award Preseason Watch List on Thursday.

Presented by the Tallahassee Quarterback Club Foundation, the award is given to college football’s most outstanding FBS receiver.

Smith-Marsette led Iowa in receiving yards (722) and touchdown receptions (5) in 2019, while ranking second on the team in receptions (44). Smith-Marsette led the Big Ten and ranked fourth in the nation with a 29.6 yard kickoff return average on 17 returns last season.

In Iowa’s 2019 Holiday Bowl win over USC, Smith-Marsette became only the second player in school history to score a receiving, rushing, and kickoff return touchdown in the same game, earning the Holiday Bowl Offensive Most Valuable Player award.

Smith-Marsette was named a preseason first-team All-America selection as a return specialist by Phil Steele, and a preseason first-team All-Big Ten return specialist and a fourth-team All-Big Ten wide receiver by Athlon Sports earlier this summer.

Smith-Marsette knows there are high expectations on him.

"It shows you've been working hard, doing what you have to do," he said back in May. "But it also shows that I'm the type of person that doesn't let those type of things boost me too high to the point where I can't produce. So, just being able to hear that is definitely a confidence booster, but it's not to the point where it's, 'Oh my God, I've got to make sure that I maintain.'"

The Biletnikoff Award is named after pro and college football Hall of Fame receiver Fred Biletnikoff, a consensus All-American at Florida State and an All-Pro for the Oakland Raiders.

Semifinalists for the award will be announced Nov. 16, followed by three finalists being announced Nov. 23. The winner will be announced Dec. 10 live on ESPN at The Home Depot College Football Awards Show.