Heisman Trophy 2011: Trent Richardson, Tyrann Mathieu Among Five Finalists

There's not really much surprise in the announcement, but Alabama's Trent Richardson and LSU's Tyrann Mathieu were announced as among five finalists for the Heisman Trophy, set to be given out Saturday in New York City. There will be only one showdown between the two this time.

And there will be others joining them, including late frontrunner Robert Griffin III, or RG3, the dual-threat quarterback from Baylor, Wisconsin's Montee Ball and Stanford's Andrew Luck. Simple math and realpolitik tell you that this is a bad geographic distribution for Richardson and Mathieu -- they are the only ones who come from the same region. The odds that the two SEC players split the Southern vote and potentially lose the award that way are probably not huge, given that the nationalized media landscape makes bias less of a factor, but some chance of that happening is still there.

Richardson rushed for 1,583 yards and 20 touchdowns on 263 carries and had 327 yards and three touchdowns on 27 catches. Mathieu forced seven turnovers and scored four touchdowns despite being a mostly defensive player. He had 420 yards in punt returns on 33 attempts.