Pitt’s Donald Keeps Grabbing Honors, UNC Loses OC Anderson to Arkansas State

Last week ACC phenom, Florida State quarterback Jameis Winston, grabbed all the headlines with his awards, ending on Saturday with his Heisman win. This came as his fellow conference player stood in the shadows with his own accolades, Pittsburgh defensive tackle Aaron Donald.

Just as Winston hit the motherlode in awards, so did Donald on the defensive side.

This week he has been named to the first-team All-American list as determined by the American Football Coaches Association and Football Writers Association of America on Wednesday. With the honor, he is the first Pitt player to receive unanimous All-America honors since 2003. This nod last went to wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald.

Aaron Donald

Donald is now the 12th player in Panther history to have the first-team honor with the last defensive player to do so was defensive end Hugh Green back in 1979 and 1980.

But there’s more as Donald also won national awards last week. Four of them. This included the Bednarik (best defensive player), the Lombardi (top lineman or linebacker), the Nagurski (best defensive player) and the Outland (interior defensive/offensive lineman). This makes him the most decorated college player on the defensive side since 2009 with Ndamukong Suh (Nebraska).

And we all know how he was fared in the league.

Now this week, Aaron has added another honor to his growing collection: CBSSports.com named him the Defensive Player of the Year (Winston grabbed the offensive honor).

Donald said of his latest award with a humble, “Blessing. Hard work pays off.”

The 6′, 285-pound player’s stats for this final NCAA season included 26.5 backfield stops–an average of 2.2 per game, which was a national high. He also had four forced fumbles (a career high), 10 sacks, 54 tackles and two pass deflections, according to CBS Sports.

His height for the pros has been a topic of concern but Donald has said he views it as a strength, commenting, “That’s leverage from those big guys.”

Next up on his last stop for Pitt before looking toward the 2014 NFL Draft is the Dec. 26 Little Caesars Bowl. Pitt will take on Bowling Green. Vegas doesn’t seen Donald getting one more feather in his cap as Bowling Green will get the win (-5, 50 o/u).

UNC OC Anderson Jumps Ship to Arkansas State

The college coaching carousel is starting to turn this time of year and the latest coach to jump on is North Carolina offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Blake Anderson. He accepted the head coaching spot at Arkansas State on Thursday.

Blake Anderson

Anderson had been with the Tar Heels for the last two seasons and now he’ll become Arkansas State’s fifth coach in five seasons. He will take over for Bryan Harsin, who left the program after just one season to accept the head coach role at Boise State.

This year, the Red Wolves went 7-5 (5-2) and will play in the GoDaddy.com Bowl against Ball State (10-2, 7-1). Ball State will get the win (-8.5, 64 o/u).

The new stint at Arkansas State will be Anderson’s first head coaching gig. He has coached under UNC’s coach Larry Fedora during the last two years after previously doing so with him at Southern Miss. In 2012, UNC’s offense hit a new school record with its 40.6 points per game and 485.6 yards per game.

The Tar Heels (6-6, 4-4) will play Cincinnati (9-3, 6-2) in the Belk Bowl and get the win (-3, 56.5 o/u).

For the Red Wolves, they’re used to an active coaching carousel. Prior to Harsin’s tenure, Steve Roberts was there in 2010 (after nine seasons); Hugh Freeze (Ole Miss) was the coach for the 2011 season and Gus Malzahn (Auburn) spent the 2012 season as the coach.

Will Anderson follow suit and jump ship after one year?