Hardesty shows his worth as starting RB

By Mary Kay Cabot

Cleveland Plain Dealer

BEREA

Peyton Hillis’ absence from the Dolphins game with strep throat had a silver lining: Montario Hardesty got his first NFL start and rocked it.

Now the Browns believe they have two formidable backs.

“When I looked at the numbers here, I wanted to play [Hardesty] more, but not 61 snaps [against Miami],” said coach Pat Shurmur. “But that’s the way it worked out.”

A little more than two hours before kickoff, Shurmur had to alter his gameplan when Hillis said he wasn’t up to playing. Hillis was still weak and ill when he woke up Sunday morning.

“We were really short-handed at running back,” said Shurmur. “We really had only three runners. We had Armond [Smith], Montario, and our fullback Owen [Marecic].”

What’s more, Shurmur had to dump more than a few plays off his playsheet.

“We had plays in the game to feature both Peyton and Montario,” he said. “That obviously went onto other things when the roster changes.”

But it was the moment Hardesty had been waiting for since he was drafted by the Browns in the second round out of Tennessee in 2010.

“An opportunity presented itself and I wanted to go out there and play well and play hard, so it was fun,” said Hardesty. “I haven’t played much football in a long time. To do it on this stage, plus to get a win like that, it was great for our team and we have to take that momentum and keep moving forward.”

Hardesty finished with 67 yards on 14 carries for a 4.8-yard average and a long of 19. He caught three passes for 19 yards, including a 10-yard swing pass on fourth down on the game-winning touchdown drive — one of the biggest plays of the afternoon.

The play, to the Dolphins’ 27, helped set up Colt McCoy’s TD pass to Mohamed Massaquoi.

“Montario played great,” said McCoy. “We thought Peyton was going early, and then when Peyton couldn’t make it, that’s hard on a guy. To have Montario step and play like he did — he hadn’t got all the reps this week — it says a lot about him.

“I fed off him [Sunday]. He was fired up in the huddle saying, ‘Give me the ball.’ He made some real nice cuts in the hole. He was huge for us.’

Hardesty made his presence felt early, with two runs and a reception on the six-play, second-quarter TD drive that ended with Josh Cribbs’ leaping 33-yard TD catch.

“Part of Montario’s game, I think he’s a very instinctive runner,” said Shurmur. “If we can get him back to 100 percent — which he’s approaching — I think we’ll see that. That’s what we saw in him in college and that’s why he’s here.”