Within a matter of a little over 24 hours a pair of former Montana State University, now National Football League, players had milestone, if not historic games.
Linebackers Alex Singleton, a four-year NFL veteran, and Troy Andersen, who’s in his rookie season, both had game-highs in tackles. Of the 14 NFL games played in Week 6, they were the leading tacklers in two of them. As if that’s not enough, Andersen did so in his first starting assignment for the Atlanta Falcons and Singleton just missed tying a league record for solo tackles on Monday Night Football for the Denver Broncos.
As linebackers, both are expected to be in on a lot of tackles. Singleton has led his teams numerous times in that department. He led the entire Canadian Football League in tackles in 2017. Nonetheless, it’s rare when a pair of linebackers from a single school, let alone a single Football Championship Subdivison school, are their game’s leading tacklers on the same weekend of an NFL schedule.
Andersen, playing for the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday in a 28-14 win over the San Francisco 49ers, has been impressing coaches and fans alike with his play in spot duty and on special teams all year – he blocked a punt that was returned for a touchdown earlier in the season. Sunday, the Dillon product collected 13 tackles, including seven solo tackles. He tracked down speedy punt returner Ray-Ray McCloud on a play that put Andersen’s speed on display during a 35-yard return.
Singleton, playing for the Denver Broncos on Monday Night Football in a narrow 19-16 loss, put his name in the NFL record book by collecting 19 solo tackles – the second most in league history – as he was seemingly everywhere with 21 total tackles, two tackles-for-loss, one pass deflection, and one quarterback hit. Singleton put his name in with some good company as the other players in the top ten of the solo tackle category were either drafted in the top two rounds or All-Pro, and most of them were both.
While Andersen is fresh on the NFL scene, Singleton, who was undrafted out of college, has bounced around the league with brief stops at Seattle, New England and Minnesota as a rookie before getting drafted by the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League. He thrived in the CFL for three seasons and was named the leagues Most Outstanding Defensive Player in 2017 and led the Stamps to the 2018 Grey Cup title.
His success there led to an NFL contract with Philadelphia Eagles. After two seasons there he was signed by Denver as a free agent.
Monday night he got off to a hot start and had six tackles, all solo, at the start of the second quarter and had eight of each with 9:09 remaining in the half. He got hot again in the fourth quarter and ran his totals to 19 and 18 at the end of regulation of the overtime game. By comparison, no other player in the game had more than 10 total tackles and the second highest number of solo tackles was seven.
Andersen’s career, while much shorter, has been much more distinguished in the early going. He was drafted in the second round of the NFL draft after eye-popping results at the NFL Combine, including running a 4.42 40-yard dash – the fastest time by a linebacker at the combine and just .04 of a second behind the fastest linebacker time ever run at the combine.
He got the combine invite after an amazing collegiate career that saw him awarded as a running back (Big Sky Freshman of the Year), quarterback (first team All-Big Sky), and linebacker (two-time, first team All-Big Sky; league and national Defensive Player of the Year).
His combination of size and speed were on display in Atlanta’s second game of the season when he went untouched past the Los Angeles Rams punt team line and not only blocked the punt, but blew up the Rams punter, while teammate Lorenzo Carter scooped up the ball and scored.
“I lined up and saw they had me double-teamed,” Carter said of the play. “I knew right away that was a mistake. I took a peek over and saw this blur and thought there goes Troy.”
Singleton just missed on a sack and was close to coming up with the potential game-winning play when he went untouched on a blitz deep in Charger’ territory. He deflected a pass by San Diego quarterback Justin Herbert nearly straight up into the air. Before Singleton could pick up the trajectory of the ball and potentially take it in for a score it, landed a few feet behind.
Andersen’s Falcons are at Cincinnati this Sunday, while Singleton’s Broncos host the New York Jets. The Falcons kickoff at 11:00 and the Broncos start at 2:05.
