Small in stature, Bears rookie Tarik Cohen always had big dreamsJon Greenberg, Writer August 17 2017
Shortly after Tarik Cohen arrived at North Carolina A&T, the only school to offer him a scholarship out of Bunn (N.C.) High School, he had to check something out.
“When I got to A&T,” he told me after Wednesday’s practice, “I started researching everyone who went to the NFL from historically black colleges, the last person who went. I did a whole lot of research looking at my chances of getting to the NFL.”
So no, Cohen, the Bears rookie running back, doesn’t lack for confidence and yes, he knew a little something about Walter Payton before getting drafted in the fourth round by the Bears this spring.
By the end of his college career playing in the shadows of Mitch Trubisky’s North Carolina and Mike Glennon’s N.C. State, Cohen was a three-time MEAC player of the year, a workhorse running back known for his diminutive size (5-foot-6, under 180 pounds) and prodigious statistics (a conference record 5,619 rushing yards and 56 career touchdowns in 46 games).
He was the second of four HBCU (historically black colleges and universities) players to get drafted last spring — Grambling receiver Chad Williams was taken in the third round — and is now part of a special fraternity.
Like every HBCU star, Cohen obviously wanted to go play at a bigger school at first and now that he's in the NFL, he can say it was all a blessing.
“I was trying to get into a bigger school, but then I was on the grateful side because it was my only offer,” he said. “I’m going to take this and run with it. And then when I got there they taught me about the culture, and the atmosphere was great, so it really taught me a lot.”
In a potentially savvy, completely self-aware move, the MEAC and the SWAC waved farewell to an FCS playoff berth in 2015 and focused on its own bowl game, the ESPN-owned Celebration Bowl, which airs on ABC. It was a callback to the days where HBCUs got national TV exposure and small-school legends were born.
In his North Carolina A&T days, running back Tarik Cohen sliced and diced Alcorn State Braves in the 2015 Celebration Bowl. (Brett Davis/USA TODAY Sports)
Cohen rushed for 295 yards and three touchdowns in the first Celebration Bowl and was awarded the inaugural Black College Football Player of the Year award last year during the festivities in Atlanta.
Doug Williams and James “Shack” Davis, the co-founders of the Black College Football Hall of Fame, gave Cohen the Deacon Jones Award, and Cohen used the occasion for more research.
“All those guys came back to the banquet,” he said. “I got to sit down and pick their brains. It’s an honor to follow in the footsteps of those players.”
What kind of advice did they give to Cohen?
“They told me to work twice as hard [in the NFL], because I got that HBCU tag on me,” he said.
Not that it’s a bad thing. Twenty-nine of the 303 enshrined in Canton went to an HBCU, including Bears greats Richard Dent (Tennessee State) and Payton (Jackson State).
Decades ago, HBCUs sent players by the truckloads to the NFL. But as colleges, particularly in the south, started recruiting black athletes and the financial gap grew between Division I power conferences and I-AA (now FCS) schools, the traditional HBCU powers faded into the background.
“I learned there’s been a steady decline,” Cohen said. “The last player drafted in the first round from an HBCU is Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie. We had someone go third round [in 2016] Javon Hargrove. I’m doing my best, they’re doing their best to pick it up.”
Cohen has a good memory. Rodgers-Cromartie was picked 16th overall by the Cardinals in 2008.
The late Steve McNair was the last great HBCU player who got acclaim in college. He was picked third overall out of Alcorn State in 1995. McNair was one of three HBCU players picked in the first round that season, followed by defensive end Hugh Douglas and defensive back Tyrone Poole. All had long NFL careers.
Since then, though, only four HBCU players have been picked in the first round, including two, receiver Sylvester Morris and defensive back Rashard Anderson, in 2000. The year before, the Bears took Alcorn State defensive end John Thierry in the first round, 11th overall. Cohen was the first NC A&T player to get drafted at all since 2005.
Because of budget problems, HBCU football teams are forced to play road “money” games and often the results aren’t pretty. But they can also be showcase games. Last season Cohen put up 258 combined yards (133 rushing, 125 receiving) in a road win over a woeful Kent State team.
In a 53-14 loss to Trubisky’s North Carolina in 2015, he only gained 69 rushing yards, while Trubisky threw for a touchdown and ran for a 35-yard touchdown in limited use. Cohen joked that Trubisky didn't know who he was.
“I don’t remember him either, though,” he said. “You tell him that.”
(To his credit, Trubisky said he remembered Cohen.)
Like a lot of HBCUs, NC A&T is home to a more famous marching band than football team: the Blue and Gold Marching Machine.
“Oh yeah we used to tell each other, you better get all your touchdowns in before halftime or no one’s going to see them,” Cohen said
That won't be a problem in the NFL. Even when the Bears are awful — which is often — fans tune in until the bitter end. Because of his size (check him out standing next to the 6-foot-6 Glennon) and speed, Cohen is already on his way to being a fan favorite.
In his first NFL game, he got seven rushes for 39 yards and returned one punt for 17 yards. He nearly broke a big run but stepped out of bounds.
“I caught myself and I was like, ‘Oh, that would’ve been crazy,'” he said. “That would've been like amazing playing in my first NFL game to make a big play on that level.”
When he was asked his goal for the second preseason game this weekend in Arizona, he said, “Stay in bounds on my next run.”
August is the time for these kind of stories, where fresh-faced rookies capture our attention. But Cohen isn't a gimmick or a good story. He's a player and should get a chance to be a complement to second-year running back Jordan Howard this year.
“Man, he’s quick as a running back,” Bears general manager Ryan Pace said after he drafted Cohen. “He’s instinctive as a running back. He was productive in every season he had there. But then you split him out of the backfield and he can shake and separate from a linebacker and a safety. He can create problems with his quickness and his suddenness and his athleticism. Again, he was one of those guys we were all pretty fired up and not just from YouTube videos.”
While everyone focuses on his height and his nicknames — and that YouTube video of him catching a pass after a backflip — when you see him up close, he just looks like an athlete.
Cohen has muscular arms and immense pass-catching hands measured 10 1/8 inches at the combine. (To put it in perspective, Trubisky is 6-foot-2 and has 9 1/2 inch hands.) Cohen’s legs are the size of fire hydrants and he ran a 4.42 40-yard dash at the combine, the 16th-fastest out of any participant this season.
But the short jokes will always be present and Cohen takes the initiative to make them himself. When he stepped up to the microphone bank after practice Wednesday, he cracked about the height of the mics.
“Who was up here before, LeBron?” he said.
Was that a pre-emptive strike?
“Definitely gotta get (the jokes) in there,” he said to me afterward.
He might as well turn his height into a positive. When Cohen was asked about the speed and size of the players in the NFL compared to the MEAC, he said that should help him.
“Since my offensive linemen are going to be bigger it’s going to be harder for the defense to see me,” he said.