Bryce Love’s putting up stats that even Christian McCaffrey never did at Stanford

Stanford had college football’s most electric running back in 2015 and 2016. In 2017, it might have the same, but this time, it’s a different guy.

Bryce Love is Stanford’s starter now that Christian McCaffrey is a Carolina Panther. Love is doing things at Stanford that even McCaffrey didn’t do:

In fact, almost nobody has:

Love entered Saturday’s game against Arizona State with 73 carries for 787 yards this season — an outrageous 10.8 yards per rush. He added 301 on 25 carries against the Sun Devils, 12 per carry. He apparently has seen what Penn State’s Saquon Barkley can do and tried to surpass it.

I’d say there’s no way Love keeps up anything like this pace, but he’s been so good that it doesn’t feel safe. There are a few players every year who finish up around 9 yards per carry, though they’re often not featured backs like Love. For instance, last year’s qualifying YPC leader was Pitt’s Quadree Henderson at 10.5, but Henderson is a wide receiver. (To qualify here, you need to play in 75 percent of your team’s games, which Love will obviously do as long as he stays healthy.)

Love is a junior, so he might not be in the college game a lot longer. When he leaves, that’ll come as a massive relief to the rest of the Pac-12.