Freshman Nick Chubb outdid Todd Gurley and all other Georgia running backs of the past 14 seasons Saturday by becoming the first player in the Mark Richt era with six consecutive games of at least 100 yards rushing.
More remarkably, Chubb did it in the first six starts of his college career.
He ran for 113 yards on nine carries in Georgia’s 55-9 rout of Charleston Southern, with most of the yardage coming when he sprinted around — and then away from — the Buccaneers’ defense for an 83-yard touchdown in the first quarter. He has 928 rushing yards in the past six games and 1,152 for the season.
Just a year ago, he was playing for Cedartown High.
“I was on the sideline thinking about that,” Chubb said after Saturday’s game. He knew how Charleston Southern felt to be on the losing end of such a score, he said, “because that was me last year versus Sandy Creek, last game of high school, getting whipped.”
Sandy Creek beat Cedartown 63-10 in that game, ending Chubb’s prolific high school career by holding him to 71 yards on 19 carries.
No opponent has been able to contain him, though, since he became Georgia’s starting tailback last month.
During Gurley’s four-game suspension for selling autographs in violation of NCAA rules, Chubb ran for 143 yards against Missouri, 202 against Arkansas, 156 against Florida and 170 against Kentucky. In Gurley’s first — and only — game back, Chubb started against Auburn while Gurley caught his breath from returning the opening kickoff. Chubb wound up with 144 yards that night.
And Saturday, as Georgia moved on from Gurley’s season-ending knee injury suffered late in the Auburn game, Chubb again surpassed 100 yards despite not playing after Georgia’s first drive of the second quarter.
Chubb’s 83-yard run was the Bulldogs’ longest rushing touchdown since Tim Worley’s school-record 89-yard score against Florida in 1985, 10 years before Chubb was born.
“I saw a lot of green grass,” said Chubb, reliving the run. “It was crowded in the middle, so I bounced it outside and it was wide open. It was a simple run. Anybody could have made that run.”
Others were more impressed — including quarterback Hutson Mason, who handed the ball to Chubb and watched him run away with it.
“I was going back and forth from watching it on the field to watching it on the Jumbotron to looking back on the field,” Mason said. “He really kicked it into second gear and took off.”
“It looked like he ran away from some folks that had pretty good angles on him,” Richt said. “That’s good to see him have that kind of game speed.”
Gurley is 464 yards short of the UGA record for most rushing yards by a freshman, Herschel Walker’s 1,616 in 1980. Chubb’s six consecutive 100-yard rushing games tops Gurley’s longest such streak of four.
Chubb got a reprieve Saturday from his recent heavy workload. His nine carries followed games of 38, 30, 21, 13 and 19.
“It’s good to carry the ball any time I can get my hands on it,” Chubb said. “I take care of my body — ice bags, stretching, yoga, things like that — so I feel good.”
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