North Carolina sophomore quarterback Sam Howell has been named the No. 11 best player in college football, according to 247Sports’ ranking of the top 50 players in the sport. The list was combined by 247Sports National writers Chris Hummer and Charles Power, along with contributions from many of the site’s national writing team.
“You’ll notice Lawrence’s section above does not include any national record exploits from his freshman season. There’s a reason for that … Howell already broke them, finishing his freshman season with 3,641 yards and 38 touchdowns, the most ever for a true freshman, against just seven interceptions,” 247Sports wrote. “He injected life into a North Carolina offense that jumped 52nd the year prior to 19th in yards per play. Howell is the nation’s top sophomore quarterback entering the 2020 season, and he looks like a potential Heisman candidate for a UNC team with a great shot to win the ACC Coastal.”
Howell was the No. 93 ranked player and No. 2 dual-threat quarterback in the 247Sports Composite for the 2019 class. He committed to UNC on December’s National Signing Day after flipping from his commitment from Florida State. Howell enrolled at Carolina in January and won the starting quarterback job midway through preseason camp in August.
He had immediate success at North Carolina. Howell threw for 245 yards (15-for-24) and two scores in UNC’s 24-20 upset win over South Carolina. Once offensive coordinator Phil Longo took the lease off Howell and the UNC offense, the Indian Trail, N.C. native really thrived. Howell started all of Carolina’s 13 games, finishing with a UNC-record 38 passing touchdowns while completing 61.4 percent of this throws.
Howell was named the 2019 Military Bowl MVP following a dominating 55-13 win over Temple. As a true freshman, he put together a streak of 13 consecutive games with multiple touchdown passes and had eight games with three or more touchdowns passes. Howell’s 3,641 passing yards was second in the ACC and ranked 14th nationally.
After a surprisingly productive and explosive first year at UNC, the national spotlight is on Howell for year two at North Carolina. Along with being named the No. 11 player in 247Sports’ rankings, Howell has made nearly every preseason watch list and is a darkhorse Heisman Trophy candidate. The 6-foot-2, 225-pound gunslinger is considered one of the best quarterbacks in the ACC and the nation. There is a lot of hype for Howell and the high-powered Tar Heels offense that returns all its major receivers from 2019 and its top two running backs.
“This is definitely a lot different from where I was last year,” Howell said on a recent episode of the ACC Network’s Packer and Durham Show. “I think the main thing to improve on is leadership. Last year I was so worried about competing for the starting job and now I can worry about making sure the other guys are ready to go.
“There is definitely a lot of hype around our team. Every time you go on twitter or see an article, it says something about how good we are supposed to be this year. I’ve told our guys just because it’s supposed to happen, doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. Every day we have to do what we’re supposed to do. That’s the main thing we’re trying to keep our head on right now. You have to block out the noise. You just have to focus on our team, focus on ourselves and focus on doing our job.”
Alongside Howell in 2020 will be star UNC wide receivers Dyami Brown and Dazz Newsome and endzone threat Beau Corrales. Rontavius Groves, Antoine Green, Emery Simmons, and freshman Josh Downs round out a deep and talented group of pass-catchers. Running backs Michael Carter and Javonte Williams will headline the ground game for the Tar Heels.
North Carolina held its first coach-led, mandatory practice of the 2020 season on Friday. From July 24 through Aug. 6, student-athletes may be required to participate in up to 20 hours of countable athletically related activities per week (no more than four hours per day). This activity includes up to eight hours per week for weight training and conditioning, up to six hours per week for walk-throughs, which may include the use of a football, and up to six hours per week for meetings, which may include film review, team meetings, position meetings, one-on-one meetings, etc.
247Sports used the criteria and method for ranking it’s top 50 players:
1. Players were initially sorted by position and were assigned rankings.
2. Players were then sorted into overall tiers.
3. Positional value was often used to break ties.
4. Generally, what a player has done in his career was used as a tiebreaker as well.
5. Some players on this list are more projections than proven entities. In those cases, we tended to be a little more cautious with their rankings while still reflecting what we expect them to become.
The full 247Sports top 50 can be found here.
No. 1 – Trevor Lawrence, QB, Clemson
No. 2 – Penei Sewell, OT, Oregon
No. 3 – Justin Fields, QB, Ohio State
No. 4 – Ja’Marr Chase, WR, LSU
No. 5 – Derek Stingley, CB, LSU
No. 6 – Micah Parsons, LB, Penn State
No. 7 – Marvin Wilson, DT, Florida State
No. 8 – Gregory Rousseau, DE, Miami
No. 9 – Chuba Hubbard, RB, Oklahoma
No. 10 – Trey Lance, QB, NDSU
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