Football | October 21, 2026

Is it fair to characterize Courtland Simmons as the old head in the running back room?

Probably not. He's a spry young man who will turn all of 22 years old two days after this year's Eastern Kentucky game. But he's been around the game and the program long enough to have a history and a past, one that already earned him one ring at Austin Peay State University and laid the blueprint he and the Govs are following in pursuit of the next one.

So, when he saw West Georgia on the schedule last week, he got the gleam in his eye just a bit.

"Just being back on that field, reminded of that," Simmons said, reminiscing on his first collegiate touchdown. "It made me smile, made me reminisce a little bit."

Many of Simmons' career-defining moments had already come against the Wolves. Carrollton is where he'd scored his first career touchdown in 2024. West Georgia was the foe on his longest career reception, an 84-yarder when the Govs hosted the Wolves at Fortera Stadium in 2025. And the return trip to Carrollton last Saturday is where he authored what might have been his most complete game to date as a Governor—16 carries for 77 yards, two receptions for another 47 and a one-yard touchdown plunge to put the game on ice late.

Simmons is the veteran, and last Saturday he got the touches, but on any given week, it could be any of Austin Peay's quartet of running backs—Simmons, Kaden Williams, Isaiah Groves and Corey Richardson are each capable of wrecking shop against any opponent.

Ask Eastern Kentucky about Groves, who needed just six carries to pile up a career-best 71 yards a year ago.

Ask Alabama A&M about Richardson, who ran for 102 yards and a score on just nine carries in the third game of his true freshman season when the Govs faced the Bulldogs in 2024.

Ask Morehead State about Williams and you'll probably get an earful—in two career games against the Eagles, he's touched the ball nine times. The result? A tidy 207 total yards and two touchdowns.

Take them together, add in the dual-threat that junior quarterback Chris Parson poses out of the backfield, and you have a rushing offense that piles up more than 160 yards per game on average, even with no individual player averaging more than 43 yards per game.

"I feel like it's an understanding of how it can always be anyone's game, anyone's time," Williams said. "Whoever has the chance is the guy that's going to step up. Everybody puts the work in to be prepared for the moment." 

The sum is considerably more than the parts in this unit, and it's clear the love the have for each other supersedes their desire for more of their own accolades.

"We all are extremely talented," Simmons said. "We all show love and support each other and we know that any moment could be any one of our opportunities. So we all always just try to stay ready. This summer, we really focused on championship connection, just growing closer to one another as the team, and it's paid off."

The Governors won last week because, when things got hard—and the Wolves proved a much more difficult out than their 1-6 record might otherwise suggest, sleep on them at your peril, other United Athletic Conference teams—Austin Peay was able to default to a rushing attack that imposed its will and won every battle at the line of scrimmage. Nowhere was this more evident than Austin Peay's final scoring drive – eight plays, all of them runs, for 66 mostly hard-won yards (there was a roughing the passer call that helped too) that ended with Simmons' plunge into the end zone. Go back and watch the film, and you won't see anything particularly fancy. You'll see a handoff, or a read option, and then the ball-carrier ramming his way through the defense while the offensive line hit whoever happened to be lined up in front of them. Not a lot of pulling and trapping on this drive; it was an old-school battle that wouldn't have been out of place in the leather helmet days.

"That's how you have to win games sometimes," said Austin Peay head coach Jeff Faris. "And I think we learned a lot about our team. That ability to go to multiple guys when the game is on the line means a lot, and those guys are doing a great job in their roles."

The Governors have four running backs capable of making a defense pay, a quarterback who can do damage with his legs and an offensive line that doesn't seem particularly interested in any sort of parleys for peace. A problem for opponents is part of the beauty of Austin Peay's backfield. There isn't one guy you have to stop. There's just the next guy coming at you.

West Georgia found that out the hard way. Eight straight runs to close out the game, with the Wolves knowing exactly what was coming and precious little they could do about it.