BALTIMORE, Md. – Morgan State junior running back Herb Walker Jr. was one of 32 players named to the College Football Performance Awards FCS National Player of the Year Watch List, the organization announced Monday. The list includes thirty-two returning performers from the Football Championship Subdivision. Twenty-four quarterbacks and eight running backs make up the initial list.

All players are eligible for awards at their respective positions; players are not preemptively eliminated from consideration. The award winner will be announced January 13, 2016.

Walker had one of the best offensive seasons in school history as he helped lead the Bears to its first Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference championship since 1979, and its first NCAA Division I Playoff berth.

As a sophomore, the Cleveland native set the school's single season rushing record by leading the Bears with 1,408 yards (ranked No. 14 in FCS), scored 15 touchdowns (13 rushing), and was named to the All-MEAC first team. In his first start of the 2014 season against Holy Cross, he carried the ball 20 times for 271 yards (a school single game record) and scored a pair of touchdowns.

He finished the season with five 100-yard rushing games and posted two games with over 200-yards. He was also named to the Walter Payton Award watch list, which is given to the most outstanding player in the FCS.

He enters his junior season with 1,798 career-rushing yards, ranking ninth on the school's all-time rushing list. He's 929 yards behind Ali Culpepper's 2,727 yards.

To see the entire 2015 CFPA FCS National Performer of the Year Trophy Watch List, click here.
 
ABOUT THE COLLEGE FOOTBALL PERFORMANCE AWARDS
The goal of College Football Performance Awards (www.collegefootballperformance.com) is to provide the most scientifically rigorous conferments in college football. Recipients are selected exclusively based upon objective scientific rankings of the extent to which individual players increase the overall effectiveness of their teams.

As prominent scholars from a wide variety of disciplines note, CFPA eliminates the politics and biases that vitiate balloting-based awards. Furthermore, CFPA has received praise from both Republican and Democratic White House officials for promoting objectivity and fairness in college football.

CFPA is now in its eighth season of player and team performance recognition.