Harvey Unga

From NCAA College Football Information & Resource

Harvey Unga

Profile
College	Brigham Young University
Position	RB
Jersey No.	45
Class	Freshman
Career	2007 – present
Height	6 ft 0 in (1.83 m)
Weight	221 lbs (100.24 kg)
Nationality	American
B-date
B-place	Provo, UT
High School	Timpview High School
Career Highlights
Awards
2007 CFN All-Mountain West Team 2007 MWC Freshman of the Year 2007 All-MWC Second Team 2007 Phil Steele's All-MWC Second Team 2007 Rivals.com All-Mountain West Team 2007 TSN Freshman All-America Second Team
Championships
2007 MWC Champion
Bowl Games
2007 Las Vegas Bowl

Harvey Unga plays running back for the Brigham Young University Cougars in the NCAA college football tournament. Unga had a breakthrough freshman year after collecting 1,227 rush yards which is a BYU and Mountain West Conference freshman record. The Provo, Utah native also became the first Cougar to earn freshman-of-the-year honors since Austin Collie was named the league's top freshman in 2004. His rushing yards production is also the highest single-season rushing total since Doak Walker Award winner Luke Staley produced 1,582 yards in 2001.

1 Personal Life
2 High School
3 College
- 3.1 2006
- 3.2 2007
4 Highlights
5 Achievements
- 5.1 2007
6 References
7 External Links

[edit]

Personal Life

Harvey is the son of Jackson and Theresa Unga. His father was a former Cougar in the early 80's while his uncle, Fine Unga, was a former Provo running back in the Sean Covey era who earned all-America honors at Dixie College and Weber State before ending up with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Prior to his stint with BYU, Harvey got involved in illegal activities, obtaining and selling prescription painkillers, breaking in to business establishments, etc. but later on changed his ways after attending an LDS Church meeting which hosted a missionary farewell for one of his close friends. Aside from football, Harvey was also into basketball.

[edit]

High School

Unga attended Timpview High School where as a ninth-grader, he was utilized as a linebacker and a safety but was only used as a second-string running back on the school's freshman squad. He started garnering attention from collegiate scouts during his junior year, where he was the team's offensive MVP and a Deseret News All-Region selection. On his senior season, the consensus all-state running back rushed for more than 1,800 yards to lead his team to the 2004 State Championship and earn for himself his second team offensive MVP.

[edit]

College

Several colleges showed interest in Unga, but he later on trimmed his options to two, Utah and BYU. In 2005, Unga orally committed to Utah in January but backed out a week or so before the national signing day and decided to go to BYU instead. He later on grayshirted for the Cougars that season to handle personal problems.

[edit]

2006

Unga was able to strut his stuff the year after grayshirting, but his supposedly rookie year was cut short by a season-ending hip injury he sustained against Boston College. Unga recorded 9 yards in four carries with a scoring run in a win against Tulsa.

[edit]

2007

Unga was granted a redshirt year and returned to fall camp in August. He finally made his debut as a redshirt freshman against Arizona where he run 15 times for 67 yards and 1 TD, and also recording 9 catches for 127 yards with 1 TD to earn the nod as the Mountain West Conference Offensive Player of the Week awardee in the Cougars' season-opening win. He set his career highs in carries (25) & rush yards (177) against UNLV, scoring runs (3) against San Diego State, and receptions (9) & receiving yards (127) against Arizona. He had a total of seven 100-yard rushing games (BYU freshman record) and two 100-yard receiving games and ran for atleast a touchdown in nine of BYU's 12 regular season games. He also made his bowl game debut against UCLA in the Las Vegas Bowl where he rushed 17 times for 16 yards and caught 3 passes for 26 yards in the postseason win. He went on and finished the year with 244 carries for 1,227 yards and 13 TDs and caught 44 passes for 655 yards and 4 scores. His rush yards have made him BYU's and MWC's leading freshman rusher. In the process, Unga became the first BYU freshman running back to eclipse the 1,000-yard mark on the season.

[edit]