Chuba Hubbard is Proving He’s More Than a Single Utility Scatback

When Chuba Hubbard signed with Oklahoma State out of high school, the Canadian import was touted for speed. After all, he came to OSU to play football and run track. He was a world class sprinter for Canada who once ran a 10.55 100-meter dash to place fourth in the World Youth Championships (and he was a three-time national champion for his age group.)

Hubbard’s hype was subdued significantly last season after redshirting and riding the pine, but 2018 has been the breakout many expected — and maybe more. As suspected, he’s shown off some of his world class speed at various Big 12 venues. But he’s proven to be far more than a single utility scatback for the Pokes, bringing both pace and physicality into a mature-beyond-his-years game to the OSU backfield.

Hubbard, as we saw Saturday, has impressed most by his versatility to do it all up to this point inside and outside the tackles. When asked Saturday if Gundy expected Chuba to be this physical, his reply was, “Not really.”

“Coming from Canada, no disrespect to them, they are way behind in American football compared to us,” added Gundy. “I worried about [the physicality] because Chuba didn’t take a lot of hits. But when he got here as a freshman, we realized he was going to be a physical young man. Knock on wood, we needed him to be physical and stay healthy and fresh [and he did].”

With Justice Hill and J.D. King sitting out Saturday, Chuba was given a simple task, really: Tote a career-high in carries and make good use of them.

The result was a career-high 134 yards rushing on a career-high 26 carries in a season-altering win over No. 9 West Virginia. He was great and, most importantly, timely, given OSU’s lack of depth against the Mountaineers at the position.

“We knew we had to do something big for the seniors,” Chuba said. “We wanted to let them go out with a bang and we just gave it all we had. It was a big win.”

A huge win all around — for Oklahoma State, for Chuba, for the future of the running back position in Stillwater. Whether Justice Hill stays or goes to the NFL, it’s safe to say there may not be much — if any — dropoff at the position next season. Chuba’s unexpected, yet welcomed, transformation into an every down back in the Big 12 assures the reputation of RBU is here to stay for the foreseeable future.