Jonathan Taylor is tied with former Clemson running back Raymond Priester for 138th on the all-time FBS rushing list. Taylor isn't done with his sophomore season.
Taylor, a former three-star recruit who was ranked behind 23 other running backs in the 2017 class (247Sports), enters the Pinstripe Bowl with 1,989 rushing yards this season, first in the country. He already has more touchdowns (15) and yards than last year, in which he set the FBS record for most rushing yards by a freshman and finished sixth in Heisman Trophy voting.
Taylor leads all active FBS players with 152.5 yards per game, has topped 100 yards in 21 of his 26 career games, has seven 200-yard games and is 34 yards shy of 4,000 for his career.
He's a sophomore.
MORE: Taylor Found Perfect Fit at Wisconsin
The Badgers' hellish 7-5 regular season — their first regular season with seven or fewer wins since 2008 — shoved Taylor off the national radar for most of the year. His 1,989 yards and 7.1 yards-per-attempt average were enough to win the Doak Walker Award as the nation's best running back, but Taylor and his (presumably, with 11 yards in the Pinstripe Bowl) 2,000-yard season went largely unnoticed as Wisconsin lost to BYU and Minnesota and didn't come close to a widely predicted playoff berth.
Even against a strong Miami (FL) rush defense at Yankee Stadium, Taylor should enter next season with, roughly, 4,100 career rushing yards, putting him 3,025 yards shy of Ron Dayne's all-time FBS record (7,215). If Taylor averages 6.5 yards per carry (currently 6.8) on 275 carries (currently 290) in each of the next two years, he'll finish with 7,675 yards.
Assumptions: Taylor passes on the 2020 NFL Draft, Wisconsin adequately replaces All-Big Ten guards Michael Deiter and Beau Benzschawel (after this season) and, among other things, avoids major injury.
Jonathan Taylor is only halfway through his career, but the 5-foot-11, 221-pounder is already chasing college football history.
