The Roost’s 2020 Rice Football Season Superlatives exist to honor exceptional Owls who made a difference on the field this season. Here’s the complete list.
There were many individual performances worth recognizing in the 2020 Rice Football season. In addition to the more traditional awards below, make sure to check out The Roosties, the second annual award show from The Roost Podcast, which features a different angle of honors. From our favorite plays to the players we were most wrong about in the preseason, we cover some of the more creative superlatives on the show.
Defensive Newcomer of the Year — CB Miles McCord
Full Story: Defensive Newcomer of the Year Award
Excerpt: “McCord’s rise is a feel good story. He’s another junior college player turned into a Conference USA mainstay by this coaching staff. But more than anything, he kept an elite defense operating at the same level through a year flush with challenges. When Rice needed someone to hold the line, McCord stepped in and elevated the play of those around him. The Owls will be glad to have him patrolling the boundary for years to come.”
Offensive Newcomer of the Year — RB Khalan Griffin
Full Story: Offensive Newcomer of the Year Award
Excerpt: “Rice had the No. 3 rushing defense in the conference this fall. One player surpassed 100 yards on the ground against the Owls all season. Preseason all-conference rusher Brenden Knox averaged a meager 3.8 yards per carry on 20 attempts, tallying 76 yards against the stout Rice front seven. Griffin had more than double that after initial contact in his first padded scrimmage. The bar had been set.”
Rising Star — WR Jake Bailey
Full Story: Rising Star Award
Excerpt: “Bailey was gritty and dependable. He was effective at all levels of the field, and he did it with his head down, ready and willing to work. The box scores in a shortened season don’t boast overwhelming totals. The negated plays that were inches away from going the other way don’t help the numbers either. But the player that Bailey became was irrevocably better than the version of himself he was the year prior. And he looked pretty good then.”
Special Team’s Player of the Year — P Charlie Mendes
Full Story: Special Team’s Player of the Year Award
Excerpt: “As good as Rice has been on special teams in three years under head coach Mike Bloomgren, it hasn’t been nearly as smooth of a ride at any other facet of the third phase. Rice muffed punts in three consecutive games this year. Place kicking was good, albeit with a few notable, painful bad bounces. The Owls’ only return touchdown was called back via penalty. But punting, punting was never a problem. Because of Mendes.”
Defensive Player of the Year — LB Blaze Alldredge
Full Story: Defensive Player of the Year
Excerpt: “Boiled down to its core, Alldredge was a culture builder for a program in desperate need of a reformed identity. The defense allowed 36.0 points per game in Alldredge’s first season. This year the Owls surrendered 18.8 points per game. From one extreme to the other. It doesn’t really matter which statistic you pick, Alldredge made the defense better.”
Offensive Player of the Year — QB Mike Collins
Full Story: Offensive Player of the Year
Excerpt: “His 10 passing touchdowns in three games were the most in the first three Conference USA games of any quarterback in school history. He was efficient, leading the offense to 30+ points in two of his three appearances, a scoring total the Owls had only reached twice in their previous 25 games. His final outing came on the road against North Texas. Rice would lose, but Collins would throw for 300 yards for his first time as an Owl.”
Team MVP — WR Austin Trammell
Full Story: Team MVP
Excerpt: “The next time Rice took the field, Trammell was more than involved, he was the centerpiece of the Rice offense. He caught three touchdowns against Southern Miss, torching the entire secondary down the sideline for a 72-yard score. He found the paydirt again in the first quarter of the Owls’ third game against North Texas. In the span of seven quarters, from the end of the first game to the beginning of the third, he scored six times.”
