Collegiate Times

It wasn’t a great start to 2011 for the Virginia Tech running game.

In the Orange Bowl on Jan. 3, the Hokies were held to 66 rushing yards in a crushing 40-14 loss to Stanford.

Less than a week later, both Darren Evans and Ryan Williams announced they were leaving school early to enter the NFL Draft.

The pair combined for 4,251 rushing yards and 54 total touchdowns in their careers. Evans set the school’s freshman record with 1,265 rushing yards in 2008 before Williams shattered it the next season, rushing for 1,655 yards while Evans was out for the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament.

Without question, both rank among the best players to ever come through the program.

But did they make the right decision?

The NFL’s Draft Advisory Panel informed Williams he would likely be a first- or second-round draft pick, while Evans was projected to go between the fourth and seventh round.

Running back coach Billy Hite’s stance on his players entering the draft early is if the prospect is projected to go in the first three rounds, he should leave.

In Evans’ case, it didn’t appear to be a decision based solely off his draft stock. He is married to Taneesha Evans, the mother of his four-year-old son, James.

“This will give me a chance to be a provider, and that’s what I want to do. This opportunity will allow me to do that,” Evans said.

However, as far as his playing career is concerned, Evans is taking a sizable risk by leaving now.

It’s conceivable that a fifth-round draft pick, or later, never makes an NFL team — especially as a running back. Should Evans fail to make the final roster for the team that drafts him, his pro career could possibly be over before it ever begins. Or another injury like the one he suffered in 2009 could limit his opportunities. You won’t find many running backs drafted in the later rounds with multiple severe injuries suiting up on Sundays.

“I just feel like that would be a gamble to come back. Just because my knee feels fine, you never know. I’d rather just get my foot in the door now and start to learn how everything goes at that next level rather than come back and worry about whether I get hurt or if I get enough carries — you just never know,” Evans said.

Evans made his decision three days before Williams made his intentions official, which was a curious move. If Evans was worried about getting enough carries with the Hokies next year, it wouldn’t have been a problem without Williams in the fold.

It was clear that another year of three running backs was not going to work. While it was a luxury to have three all-conference caliber backs, it restricted the growth of all of them while also disallowing any of them to ever find a rhythm in a game. 

Evans would have had an opportunity to share carries with David Wilson next year, rather than working through the three-back rotation that was used this year, which none of the runners seemed to enjoy. With a heavier workload and another year to improve his speed, pass-catching and lateral quickness (three things he said he must work on before the draft in April), Evans could have vaulted himself into a much higher draft position in 2012.

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A version of this article appeared in the Jan 18 issue of the Collegiate Times.