If you haven’t seen by now, it seems IUFB is likely done in the portal and I’ve put together my spring depth chart as things stand today for IU football.
You can find the working Google Sheet here as well as checking the Hoosier Huddle message board where it is a pinned topic.
It’s updated with current class, weight, height, total scholarship, walk-ons and more. I recommend viewing on a desktop and not on Twitter or any “preview” type browser. It looks much better in almost any browser than the one Twitter has. Also, you can click on the players IU profile which I update as soon as players are given a page on the IU website.
Today I’m going to hit the running back position. IU currently has 37 scholarships on offense and nearly 14% of those scholarships are going to running backs (5).
In this preview, I’ll give a little overview of where the position stands and then give my personal thoughts on the guys in this position group.
So, if you’re new to reading my depth chart stuff, I have a “Full Team” page and then a “2 Deep” page.
On the “Full Team” page, I typically keep them the same as the “2 Deep” but typically it’s harder to know where the depth is after the first couple guys and I usually put them in order of age.
Right now, I there is a very clear top 3 in the running back room. Sean Cuono, who will be a redshirt freshman in ’26, is the clear fourth option unless he plays himself into the top three or there is an injury, like we saw last season with Lee Beebe Jr.
With the two-deep, I really think IU is going to play all three guys and probably in a 35-35-30 type split, if there is any split at all. Last year, I thought Lee Beebe would be on the short end of that split, simply because I wasn’t sure how his transition up from UAB to the Big Ten would be.
But Beebe exceeded my expectations early. Despite losing the only fumble all season for IU, before Beebe tore his ACL early in the Indiana State game I thought he was the back who looked the best of the three-headed monster that was Beebe, Roman Hemby and Kaelon Black and I didn’t think it was particularly close.
Hemby and Black both ended up going over 1,000 yards for the first duo to do that at IU since 2015 (Jordan Howard and Devine Redding). They were fantastic after the Beebe injury and I will always wonder what it would have looked like with Beebe also healthy.
I wanted to mention Jordan Howard here because Lee Beebe has a little bit of Jordan Howard in him. They both came to IU from UAB and they have very similar running styles. One of the things I always look for in a running back is how they take hits. Howard and Beebe seem to never take direct hits. They’re always able to angle their bodies to get guys to bounce off because of their thick base and incredible arm strength.
Beebe finished ’25 with 27 carries for 200 yards (7.4 ypc) and a TD. I tweeted this out but I think it should be deserves to be in here as well. Beebe was one of the best missed tackle forced guys out there in the limited time he played. I don’t think he’d have kept the pace up against B1G competition but the point still very much stands.
Beebe has 74 missed tackles forced on 251 career rushes (29%).
For perspective (in ‘25):
- Kaelon Black (30 on 186 attempts — 16%)
- Roman Hemby (37 on 230 attempts — 16%)
Add to the above that 52% of Beebe’s runs went for 1st downs and he finished second behind Khobie Martin (who we’ll talk about shortly) with 3.59 YCO/A (yards after contact per rush) and we’re talking a back with elite between the tackle skills.
Beebe, if/when healthy, is going to be a monster this season for Indiana. He’s built, not as a breakaway runner, but as a 5’10, 218 bruiser who is very hard to tackle. I’m very excited for him this year and it’s why I have him atop my 2 Deep as we sit here in February.
Last thing on Beebe: He’s a very good pass catcher. IU typically doesn’t throw to their backs much but both Beebe and the next guy I’m going to talk about have shown they can catch passes out of the backfield when tasked with it.
So as of right now, even though he may not practice a ton this spring, I have Beebe as my RB1 (A). Again, it wouldn’t be shocking if either of the next two guys take that spot but I loved what Beebe brought last year and hope he’s fully healed from the ACL injury and ready to go by Fall Camp.
Turbo Richard is almost an identical profile to Kaelon Black. Tough, shorter, more compact runner who won’t wow you with breakaway speed but can scoot a little bit at 5’9, 204.
I grew up a Boston College fan. Went to a couple games in the 90s then, when I moved to Chicago, had a friend who’s dad was a Notre Dame Law School grad who had season tickets. I went to 3 straight BC/ND games. My step mother is also in the BC Hall of Fame for multiple sports.
I bring that up because I still follow BC fairly closely and watched their early season games against both Michigan State and Stanford. Richard had 27 carriers for 110 yards (4.1 ypc) and a TD to go along with 12 catches for 149 yards (12.4 ypc) and 2 TD’s in those two games, but he also had two massive fumbles that probably cost his team both games.
Those fumbles cannot happen at IU and Richard had no fumbles the rest of the season so it seems like a just something to monitor.
As I said above, Richard can catch the ball too and is a genuine weapon with the ball in his hands in open space finishing ’25 with 30 catches for 213 yards (7.1 ypc) and 2 TD’s.
For his career, Richard has a YCO/A of 3.49 and 38 missed tackles on his 200 attempts (19% MTF rate).
He’s going to be running back one (B) for me in this backfield as things stand here in February…RB1 (C) is next.
I know for a fact that IUFB wanted to bring in another RB besides Richard in the portal and had a couple now SEC commits on campus before deciding that it might not be the right fit….And the reason it probably wasn’t a fit is Khobie Martin.
The redshirt sophomore Martin is a more upright runner that shows speed and power to go along with improving vision. If he ends up running back one by himself out of Spring Practice and Fall Camp, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised because he’s super talented and has the breakaway speed at 6’0, 208. There is still room for improvement, especially with his patience when hitting the hole but the sky is the limit given his physical traits and improving understanding of the offense.
Martin piled up 78 carries for 505 yards (6.5 ypc) and 6 TD’s in ’25 in mostly garbage time but you can see the potential in every carry. He’s patient and is getting better at identifying holes and once he sees a hole, he hits it hard.
Martin forced 16 missed tackles in his 78 attempts (21% MTF rate) and finished 46th among all RB’s with 3.86 YCO/A. He also finished in the 70th percentile in 15+ yard runs with 9, despite many of the guys ahead of him having sometimes hundreds more carries. Add to that that 26 of his 78 carries went for 1st downs (33%) and we’re talking about one of the better running back prospects IU has had in a long time.
And Martin is going to get a chance to showcase his abilities in spring as he and Richard will likely be the top two backs who will be healthy. I doubt IUFB pushes Beebe to practice, even though he’d be around 7-8 months removed from his ACL surgery.
To round out the depth, IU will have R-Fr Sean Cuono (5’10, 198) and Fr Jayreon Campbell (5’8, 218).
I’m not sure either will see much time next year unless there is another injury…but that same thing happened last year and thrust Martin into a massive roll as the garbage time guy who kept the chains moving and IU’s offense on the field.
Cuono and Campbell both have interesting HUDL videos and both were 3* by the services coming out of Florida and Georgia respectively. Cuono, specifically, looked like an explosive jitterbug type on his, but he’s added a lot of weight and, my guess is, that he’ll be bigger than 198 when they weigh in around the start of Spring Practice.
Campbell only played a couple games because of injury (I think…I have no idea why he wouldn’t play otherwise) so it will be interesting to see the spring reports since he’s already on campus and in the weight program.
Both are depth pieces at this point.