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The 1983 Georgia Bulldogs saw their chances of winning national a championship all but disappear when star running back Herschel Walker decided to skip his final season and sign a pro contract with the New Jersey Generals of the new United States Football League. The Bulldogs were national championship contenders all three years that Walker played for them. They would have been again if he had returned for his senior season.

Herschel Walker


From 1980 to 1982, Georgia lost a grand total of three games. The Bulldogs won the tough Southeastern Conference and played in the Sugar Bowl after each season. In 1980, they put an end to the stranglehold that Alabama head Coach Paul 'Bear' Bryant had on the conference by going a perfect 12-0 and winning the national championship. Walker was named All-American as a freshman and was Most Valuable Player of the Sugar Bowl.

In 1981 the Bulldogs only regular season loss came to eventual national champion Clemson in a game that Walker played with a broken wrist. Georgia was actually still in the hunt for the national championship until they lost to Pittsburgh University in the Sugar Bowl on a last second touchdown pass by Dan Marino.

Georgia went undefeated in the regular season again in 1982 and headed to New Orleans ranked number one. There, they met second ranked Penn State for all of the marbles and lost 27-23. Walker won the Heisman Trophy and it was believed he would come back to win it again in 1983. It was also believed that Georgia would win another SEC title and play for the national championship.

New Jersey Generals


However, the USFL changed everything by offering Walker a chance to sign with them. The National Football League had a rule against signing players who were not four years removed from college, but the new league did not. Since there was no law stopping them from signing underclassmen, the Generals inked Walker to one of the most lucrative deals in pro football history and he turned in his letter man's jacket.

For three years, Georgia's offense had basically been Walker left, Walker right, Walker up the middle. Occasionally quarterbacks Buck Belue and John Lastinger threw the ball, but everyone knew that Walker was going to get it three out of every four plays. With Walker gone, the Bulldogs had to find another way to win.

Fortunately, head coach Vince Dooley had put together a team that could still challenge for the title without Walker. The Bulldogs did not win the SEC or compete for the national championship, but did go 9-1-1 to earn a trip to the Cotton Bowl. There they faced the undefeated, untied Texas Longhorns who with a victory and a loss by the Nebraska Cornhuskers later in the Orange Bowl could win their first national championship since 1970.

John Lastinger


The Bulldogs defeated Texas 10-9 on a touchdown run by Lastinger. For once, Georgia was the one who spoiled someone else's national championship hopes. For the fourth straight season, Georgia finished a season with 10 or more wins.

It was a great year, but could have been a championship one had Walker returned for one last championship run.
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Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel won the Heisman Trophy as a rdshirt freshman in 2012 and will try to become the second man to win it twice in 2013. Many have tried to win the Downtown Athletic Award statue two times, but only Archie Griffin of Ohio State did. How did other returning Heisman winners fare?

Doc Blanchard


In the days of no facemasks, Army boasted two of the best backs in the country in Glen 'Mr. Outside' Davis and Felix 'Doc' Blanchard, known as 'Mr. Inside. The Cadet flashes helped lead Army to back to back undefeated seasons in 1945 and '46 which earned each the trophy. In 1945 Blanchard took home the award and Davis followed up by winning it the next year.

The 1948 Heisman was won by Southern Methodist University halfback Doak Walker. The All-American from Highland Park, Texas did not have a teammate to battle in 1949, but missed most of that season with injuries. When Walker played, he did well and there was some sentiment for him to win the Trophy again. However, Walker wrote to the voters and told them that he was not deserving of it. Leon Hart of Notre Dame ended up being one of the few men who was not a back to win it.

Ohio State's Vic Janowicz had a chance to beat Griffin to history by winning the Heisman in 1950. In 1951, he was beaten out by the last man from the Ivy League to win it in Princeton halfback Dick Kazmaier.

Roger Staubach Navy


Navy quarterback Roger Staubach was next in 1963. He won the trophy while leading the Midshipmen to the Cotton Bowl. Like Walker, Staubach suffered through an injury filled senior season and could not repeat the magic of his junior year.

After Griffin made history in 1975, Oklahoma's Billy Sims had a chance to tie him almost immediately. He won the award in 1978 over Charles White of Southern Cal. White came back in 1979 to beat out Sims.

Beginning with Georgia running back Herschel Walker in 1982 a succession of Heisman winners skipped their senior seasons after winning the award. Walker left for the United States Football league in 1983. From 1988 to 1991, Barry Sanders, Andre Ware, Ty Detmer and Desmond Howard all won the award as juniors. Only Detmer came back for his senior year and he lost out on the award to Howard.

Southern Cal quarterback Matt Leinart won the award as a junior in 2004 and returned for his senior year. In 2005 he helped his junior teammate Reggie Bush do the same (Bush's award has been vacated due to NCAA infractions). Unlike Leinart, Bush decided not to return to SC.

Florida quarterback Tim Tebow had two chances to win it twice as he won the award as a sophomore in 2007. Tebow came back for his junior year, but lost out to another underclassmen quarterback in Sam Bradford of Oklahoma. Neither Tebow nor Bradford could win the award the next year as another junior, running back Mark Ingram of Alabama, took home the trophy.

Mark Ingram


Since Tebow won the award, every winner has been an underclassman. Ingram, Cam Newton of Auburn and Robert Griffin III of Baylor all won and left for the pros. Now it is Manziel's turn as he is will not eligible for the NFL draft until 2014.

Will he join Griffin or the long list of underclassman Heisman winners who did not win the award again?
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I did not become a full-fledged college football fan until 1982. When the NFL Player's Association decided to go on strike that year, I had no choice. The college game was all there was until late November.

Herschel Walker


Before 1982, I watched college football, but did not follow it. The NFL was my game, but being a football nut any game that came on was must see TV. So when ABC aired their NCAA game of the week if I could watch it I did. Most of the time, I had no idea who was playing or where they were from. I just knew it was a football game. On Sunday morning, a taped broadcast of Saturday's Notre Dame game would air.

Things like the Heisman Trophy meant nothing to me until the older boys were talking about Ohio State running back Archie Griffin one day and how he had won two of them. I vaguely knew about conferences, rankings and national championships. I did know about New Year's Day bowl games and never missed a chance to watch the Rose Bowl.

Then came 1982. While waiting for the pros to return, I began watching the colleges. By now, I knew about Heisman Trophies, polls and conference affiliations. I knew that Georgia tailback Hershel Walker was considered the best player in the country. I knew that Clemson University was the defending national champion. I knew where schools were actually located.

Bo Jackson


But in 1982, I learned what college football was all about. For the first time, I found out how bitter the rivalries were in the Southeastern Conference. I had never heard of Auburn University before watching them play Alabama that year. I rooted for Auburn, because Alabama robbed my favorite team, the Southern Cal Trojans, of an outright national championship in 1978. I was thrilled when Bo Jackson scored the winning touchdown for Auburn on fourth and goal from the one.

I watched epic battles like that one and Nebraska vs. Penn State, Arkansas vs. SMU, Georgia vs. Florida, Ohio State vs. Michigan and Oklahoma vs. Nebraska. I saw great players like Walker, Jackson, Eric Dickerson, Jim McMahon, Anthony Carter, Dan Marino and Curt Warner. I still remember seeing freshman Oklahoma tailback Marcus Dupree break a long touchdown run against Nebraska. This was also the season where California beat Stanford in the famous game where the Stanford band came onto the field. By the time that the pros returned, I was hooked on the college game.

Cal Stanford


Before 1982, every football player that I imitated was a pro. After it, I found myself lining up in the I formation like Walker or running the triple option at quarterback like Nebraska's Turner Gill. Instead of dropping back in the pocket and throwing the football, I was rolling out like McMahon and throwing bullets. It was like I had found a new way to play football and just in time too as my high school career was starting.

The NFL is and has always been my first love. But beginning in 1982, college football Saturday's became important and they are to this day.
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Will the Miami Hurricanes football program ever return to greatness? Will 'The U' which boasted some of the greatest teams in college football history from 1982 to 2003 ever recapture the glory of that past?

Jimmie Johnson

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College Football: SEC Rule

March 26th 2013 20:15
Going into every season, the question of when the Southeastern Conference's dominance over college football will end must be asked. The conference has produced the NCAA's last seven BCS national champions. With the best talent pool to recruit from and top notch recruiters to mine it, there seems to be no end in sight to the SEC's dominance.

Alabama Crimson Tide
Daniel Shirey- US Presswire

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The Alabama Crimson Tide can't win college football's national championship again, can they? Head coach Nick Saban and the Tide can't roll to a third consecutive title and fourth in five years. It's never been done so why should they be the first?

Alabama Crimson Tide

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The College Football Weekend

September 24th 2012 11:31
The college football weekend saw Oklahoma fold again, LSU win a Southeastern Conference nail biter, Florida State introduce James Wilder Jr. and Notre Dame resurrect talk of a return to glory.


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College Football has Grown Stale

September 20th 2012 10:57
College football needs a shot in the arm. The game is becoming a little stale. The concentration of talent is centered too much with one conference, the Southeast. There are no more coaching personalities like Paul 'Bear' Bryant, John McKay, Woody Hayes, Barry Switzer and Jimmie Johnson. Teams shifting conferences has destroyed tradition and rivalries.


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College football finally has something better than the NFL. It is their game officials.

With their brothers in the pros locked out by owners and replaced by lower level college officials division I-A now has the best ones remaining


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Stanford Victory of SC not an Upset

September 17th 2012 10:43
Here we go. The Stanford Cardinal defeated the number two ranked Southern Cal Trojans 21-14 Saturday night and everyone is calling it an upset. Every year when a top ranked team falls early in the college football season people cry upset. The truth is that there is no such thing as an upset in sports. The Stanford victory over Southern Cal was far from one.


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