Singleton Big Ten's top freshman, even if he's probably not Lions' best

ALTOONA, Pa. -- Nicholas Singleton was going to win the award. No doubt. He had to.

So, it was no surprise the Penn State running back was named Big Ten Freshman of the Year on Tuesday. Singleton was very much a deserving winner -- an electrifying running back who has the stats and big plays to warrant such an award.

Singleton had been named the league's freshman of the week three times -- more than any other player, which also made it pretty obvious that he would receive the overall season award.

The truly fascinating thing, though, is this: Even though Singleton was honored as the Big Ten's top freshman, many who closely follow the Nittany Lions would say he's not even the best freshman on this year's team.

That would be linebacker Abdul Carter.

And furthermore, Singleton may not even be the best freshman running back on his own team.

A strong case can be made that would be Kaytron Allen.

If any of that sounds like a knock on Singleton, it's really not. It's merely pointing out that the Lions have two other outstanding freshmen who also were deserving of the Big Ten award.

I posed this question on Twitter, knowing full well how the results likely would play out:

Singleton leads the Lions with 941 yards rushing and 10 touchdowns on the ground, to go along with 11 catches for 85 yards and one score. He burst onto the scene early with long touchdown runs against Ohio in Week 2, giving the Lions a home run threat they didn't have on the ground the previous two years.

Allen has 830 yards rushing and nine touchdowns. The two of them became the first Big Ten freshmen tandem ever to top 700 yards rushing in the same season.

But while Singleton was excellent early on -- with more than 100 yards against Ohio and Auburn -- it was actually Allen who led the Lions in rushing during Big Ten play and seemed to be the more consistent runner. Allen had 644 yards in the league, while Singleton had 596.

Allen also had better receiving numbers (17 for 172 yards, 1 TD) than Singleton (11 for 85 yards, 1 TD).

Both running backs were good, but as the season went on, it became pretty clear that Penn State's best freshman was playing on the other side of the ball.

Carter became a major disruptive force at linebacker, constantly in on the action to blow up plays. He began drawing more comparisons to former Penn State star and current Dallas Cowboys star Micah Parsons, who also wore No. 11 with the Lions.

Carter leads the Lions with 6.5 sacks and 10.5 tackles for loss, while ranking second with 55 total tackles. He also four pass breakups, five QB hurries and two forced fumbles.

Carter was named second-team all-conference defense on Tuesday, while Singleton was a third-team selection on offense Wednesday.

BIG TEN HONORS

Ten Penn State offensive players received all-conference honors Wednesday.

LT Olu Fashanu (second team)
RB Nicholas Singleton (third team)
C Juice Scruggs (third team)
TE Brenton Strange (third team)
RB Kaytron Allen (honorable mention)
QB Sean Clifford (honorable mention)
OL Bryce Effner (honorable mention)
OL Hunter Nourzad (honorable mention)
WR Parker Washington (honorable mention)
OL Sal Wormley (honorable mention)