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Greene turning heads for Northeastern


In my weekly notes column yesterday, I profiled Northeastern running back Aaron Greene who, besides being one of the area's better running backs, is by all accounts one of the tougher players around.

For sure, Greene beats to his own drum a bit. At Bobcats practice on Wednesday, the senior was always sprinting from drill to drill, always whooping it up, always pulsating with energy.

"He's always yelling. He's always hitting someone," said Emerson Hauck, Northeastern's senior tight end and Greene's friend. "He's crazy."

He's also pretty good. Through two games, Greene is second in the YAIAA in rushing. He almost single-handedly led the Bobcats' comeback last Friday against Columbia, running for 211 yards and four touchdowns.

Greene isn't the biggest back -- he's listed at 5-foot-8, 180 pounds. But he has a tailback's frame, a cut upper body and legs built like miniature silos. He looks not unlike his favorite football player, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice. Minus about 30 pounds of muscle, of course.

"Sometimes there's going to be a lot of people bigger than you," Greene said. "So if you don't come with it, you're going to be on your back."

And make no mistake, Green runs hard. He uses those thick legs to churn through tackles. During Bobcats practice Wednesday, one of the team's assistant said in reference to Todde Statum, the prolific Shippensburg running back Northeastern will play Friday: "He's like AG. Just when you think he's down, he's not."

Greene hopes to play football in college, and said Wednesday he's had recent conversations with coaches from Florida A&M and Kutztown.

First, Greene needs to build on a solid 2009 campaign in which he ranked third among YAIAA junior running backs with 834 yards. He's off to a solid start, but teams are going to begin keying on him. And Northeastern's upcoming schedule (at Shippensburg, at William Penn, vs. Dallastown) does him no favors.

At the very least, Greene has the talent to be a first-of-his-kind player at a program still in its relative infancy. And if he can continue to put up big numbers, Northeastern's goal of making the postseason could start to look more realistic.

"We're definitely capable of making the playoffs," Greene said.