The Centurions: #15 Michael Carter

The Star-Bulletin's countdown of UH football's "Centurions", the 100 greatest players in the University of Hawaii's 100 years of football, continues with #15, quarterback Michael Carter.

What?! He's not top 10?! Blasphemy! Anyway, Jason Kaneshiro profiles one of my favorite UH football players of all time, Michael Carter.

Carter wasn't the fastest quarterback to play for the Rainbows, nor did he have the strongest arm around. But he possessed the decision-making skills required to operate Paul Johnson's triple-option attack and a willingness to absorb the punishment that came with the job.

"He'd get smacked just about every play," said Darrick Branch, a UH receiver in the early 1990s. "He had a lot of bumps and bruises and time and time again we'd see Michael Carter get up and go back to the huddle and lead the team. That's how he'd always been.

"Even before he came to UH that's what we heard about him: He's a tough guy and he's not afraid to play ball the way it's supposed to be played."

Carter finished his career in 1993 and still owns the UH record for rushing touchdowns with 39 and is the second-leading rusher in school history with 2,528 yards, trailing only Gary Allen.

Carter's comfort with contact was a product of his football background growing up in Southern California, and he didn't resign himself to the role of victim when running the ball.

"I was a quarterback and a linebacker from my Pop Warner days all the way up until high school," he said. "I kind of played with a linebacker's mentality. ... And a lot of my time was spent practicing with the running backs, so I actually learned how to deliver blows instead of taking them."