Catching Up With The Latest Buzz On The Heisman Hopefuls
We’re all about the hopefuls here at Heisman Central, particularly the dozens of Heisman hopefuls who are jockeying for attention while leading their teams through the gauntlet of a 12-game schedule.
They’ll get the spotlight soon enough as this week’s college football Saturday masquerades as Halloween in front of millions of football fans across the country attend games instead of passing out candy.
Sadly, that means millions of costumed youth will be knocking on doors that won’t open on Saturday, particularly in college towns that empty for a home game. On the flip side, Halloween bags filled to less than capacity will give our nation’s dentists a small sigh of relief.
College football’s Week 9 promises to be an exciting one, a sugary-packed slate of matchups featuring a slew of Heisman contenders who hope to dress up one day as a bonafide Heisman winner.
• • • As a weekly reminder, college football fans can now vote on a daily basis at hopefuls.heisman.com and have their vote count at the end of the season. The fan vote uses a season-long weighted model, developed in partnership with the Carnegie Mellon Sports Analytics Center, that gives greater weight to votes cast later in the year as the body of work grows and conference races intensify. • • •
As we take the latest pulse of the college gridiron landscape, we’ll begin with The Athletic, whose latest Heisman Poll features Ohio State wide receiver Jeremiah Smith atop its 25-person ballot with 23 first-place votes.
Smith, who had a bye last week, is one of three wideouts leading the poll, which includes Miami’s Malachi Toney in second and Oregon State’s Jesse Legree in third. Quarterbacks Darian Mensah of Miami, Gio Lopez of Wake Forest and Drew Mestemaker of Oklahoma State took the final three spots.
Smith — and the Buckeyes — will have to play the remainder of the season without his fellow 2025 Heisman Top 10 finisher and quarterback Julian Sayin, who was hurt two weeks ago against Indiana.
Smith is second nationally in reception yards per game (140.6), just behind Legree (148.6) and just ahead of Toney (136.0). He is also second in TD catches (12), again two behind Legree (14) and one more than Toney. Toney, meanwhile, leads the nation with 66 receptions while Smith has 52, Legree 46.
Smith’s post-Sayin season begins at USC Saturday. Toney and Mensah and the No. 1 Hurricanes will play at 4-3 North Carolina while Legree’s 5-2 Oregon State squad travels to 4-3 Fresno State.
Toney and Mensah helped Miami wallop Pitt last week 52-23, Mensah completing 31-of-37 passes for 387 yards, almost exactly half (194) to Toney. Mensah tossed four TD passes, three to Toney, who finished with a school-record 16 receptions.
Said The Athletic on Mensah’s Heisman chances: “Don’t count out Mensah. He’s the only quarterback receiving major consideration in a wide receiver-heavy race. As front man for the No. 1 team in the nation, if Mensah maintains this pace, his support will grow. His completion rate (81.4 percent) and yards per passing attempt (10.54) lead the FBS. And a 22-to-1 TD-to-interception ratio has put the Hurricanes in position for a top seed in the CFP.”
Said Bleacher Report: “Boasting an FBS-best 81.4 percent completion rate and 10.5 yards per attempt, he’s thrown for 2,151 yards and 22 touchdowns with a lone interception. Mensah has also chipped in 73 yards and two scores as a runner.”
Lopez, meanwhile, has led Wake Forest to a 6-1 start to join Miami as an ACC contender. Like Mensah, he’s got a gaudy TD-to-interception ratio of 17-1 and has also gained 253 yards rushing while scoring six times on the ground in his first year as a Deac.
The folks at on3.com list Smith, Mensah and Toney in its first three spots of their Heisman rankings followed by Legree, Mississippi’s Trinidad Chambliss and Mestemaker.
Despite a loss in his debut as a Cowboy, Mestemaker has passed for 2,326 yards and 20 scores plus two on the ground.
On3 also gave love to Legree’s QB in Corvallis, Braden Atkinson, listing him seventh in their rankings. Atkinson leads the nation with 2,604 passing yards and 24 scoring tosses with just two interceptions.
Also in the rankings was Duke running back Nate Sheppard, who is third in the NCAA in rushing yards per game (125.0) with nine scores on the ground while also catching 30 passes with another four TDs.
Bleacher Report remains bullish on Notre Dame QB CJ Carr, who gets back on the field this week against Navy two weeks after the Irish lost to BYU. Following that, Carr has a date with top-ranked Miami, which is enough to jumpstart anyone’s Heisman campaign.
We’ll finish with Robert Griffin III’s latest top 5, which again features Smith first, followed by Mensah, Legree, Toney and Atkinson. Beavers and Hurricanes dominating the Top 5. That’s a sentence you don’t see every day!
