Matt Blanchard among best quarterbacks in Division III in 2010, Brekke leads Hawks on play-off run to Division III Title

I spent Saturday evening immersed in the task of crunching UW-Whitewater football individual statistics from last season.

I knew that Matt Blanchard was having an outstanding season prior to fracturing the thumb on his throwing hand in the Hawks regular season finale victory over UW-La Crosse.

I was positive Blanchard was among the national leaders in pass efficiency from game one of the season.

I was flabbergasted when I checked the official WIAC season statistics and Blanchard isn’t even mentioned in any of the quarterback statistics. I’m not sure why since he started all 10 regular season games, leading the Warhawks to back-to-back unbeaten WIAC titles and a record-tying sixth consecutive conference championship.

For the record, the junior out of Lake Zurich, Illinois completed 163 of his 225 passes for 2132 yards, 21 touchdowns and just 1 interception. His passing efficiency rating was.

Again, I am baffled as to why Blanchard statistics were not part included in the WIAC season statistics or the NCAA Division III national statistics.

With Whitewater playing 15 games for a sixth consecutive season – because Blanchard played in just 10 games (entire regular season), his playing in just 66% of the Hawks games may not have met the standard for being included in the final season statistics.

If that is the reason I don’t agree.

Let’s get back to Matt Blanchard on the field.

His statistics place him No. 2 in the 2010 final NCAA Division III quarterback pass efficiency ranking.

2010 Gagliardi Trophy winner – Eric Watt of Trine University - finished No. 1 in pass efficiency completing 197 of 294 for 2874 yards including 33 touchdowns and 6 interceptions and a 182.05 efficiency rankings.

Finishing No. 2 in Division III pass efficiency was Kyle Ray of Franklin University. Ray finished 2010 with a 174.8 passing efficiency rating.

Blanchard’s 181.95 pass efficiency finished a mere point-1-0 of a percentage point behind Watt.

A healthy Blanchard, backed up by Lee Brekke who quarterbacked the Hawks to five straight playoff wins and a second consecutive NCAA Division III Title, keep Whitewater in a very healthy situation at quarterback entering training camp in mid-August.