Chris Gilbert was an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

player. Gilbert ran for 3,231 yards in 29 games for the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

in 1966–68. He was the first player in NCAA history to record three 1,000-yard rushing seasons—rushing for 1,080 as a sophomore, 1,019 as a junior, 1,132 as a senior, averaging 5.4 yards per rushing attempt. He was All-Southwest Conference three times and consensus

All-America The All-America designation is an annual honor bestowed upon an amateur sports person from the United States who is considered to be one of the best amateurs in their sport. Individuals receiving this distinction are typically added to an All-Am ...

in 1968. In his career, he returned 20 kickoffs, averaging 22.7 yards on each and scored 28 touchdowns in 29 games. He was drafted by the New York Jets in the fifth round of the

1969 NFL Draft The 1969 National Football League draft was part of the common draft, the third and final year in which the NFL and American Football League (AFL) held a joint draft of college players. The draft took place January 28–29, 1969. The draft be ...

but never played in the NFL. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1999.

References

1946 births Living people All-American college football players Texas Longhorns football players College Football Hall of Fame inductees Players of American football from Houston {{runningback-1940s-stub