1948 College Football All - America Team The 1948 College Football All - America team is composed of college football players who were selected as All - Americans by various organizations and writers that chose College Football All - America Team s in 1948 . The organizations that chose the teams included : the United Press , the Associated Press , " Collier ' s Weekly " , the International News Service ( the wire service operated by the Hearst newspapers ) , and the Football Writers Association of America . The individuals selected to the most All - American teams were SMU quarterback ( and Heisman Trophy winner ) Doak Walker , Penn center Chuck Bednarik , North Carolina running back Charlie " Choo Choo " Justice , Cal running back ( and future American League baseball MVP ) Jackie Jensen , and Michigan end Dick Rifenberg . Competition among the All - American selectors . " Collier ' s Weekly " , which began picking All - American football teams in 1888 , had employed Grantland Rice to select its All - American team for 22 years . After Rice wrote a feature story about college football for " Look " , Collier ' s replaced Rice in 1948 , hiring eight college coaches ( paying them $ 500 each ) and billing them as the " Supreme Court of Football . " The eight coaches were Frank Leahy ( Notre Dame ) , Matty Bell ( Southern Methodist ) , Tuss McLaughry ( Dartmouth ) , Bernie Bierman ( Minnesota ) , Wally Butts ( Georgia ) , Jeff Cravath ( Southern California ) , Harvey Harman ( Rutgers ) , and Lou Little ( Columbia ) . One of the innovations touted by Collier ' s for 1948 was the use of news reels provided by Warner Pathe and university athletic departments to study each player . Collier ' s circulated an initial round of ballots to members of the American Football Coaches Association ( AFCA ) , with their votes narrowing the selections to a group of 55 finalists . The panel of eight then studied the " motion pictures of the players in action " and selected the Collier ' s All - American team . Collier ' s new affiliation with the AFCA ended the " Saturday Evening Post " ' s association with the group as its All - American selectors . The competition for All - American selectors led " Time " to write an article in September 1948 about the " scrimmage " between the magazines : " No college football star hoping to make All - America takes it more seriously than the magazines which pick them . To the magazines All - Americas are a deadly business , an important piece of promotion involving the prestige of the magazines as well as their hired experts . " The Associated Press based its selections on a poll of several hundred staff writers , newspaper sports editors and broadcasters . The AP reported that its voters overwhelming agreed on five of the first - team selections - - Dick Rifenberg of Michigan at end , Buddy Burris of Oklahoma at guard , Charlie Justice of North Carolia at back , Doak Walker at quarterback , and William Fischer of Notre Dame at tackle . The first selection of separate offensive and defensive All - American squads . The biggest controversy in the 1948 All - American selection process concerned the widespread use of offensive and defensive specialists , resulting from the adoption of an unlimited substitution rule . The Associated Press considered selecting separate offensive and defensive teams , but opted to continue the tradition of picking a single squad of 11 All - Americans . The AP reported on its decision as follows : " Sharpest argument this year over bestowing All - America honors centered on the merit of recognizing men who played only offense or defense under the spreading ' two platoon ' system . Separate defensive and offensive All - America first teams were proposed . Should the present cleavage widen this could become a possibility . " In the end , the AP named only three platoon players to its All - American teams - - offensive specialists , Rifenberg , Justice and Bobby Stuart . The Central Press Association noted that its 1948 All - American eleven " is not necessarily a true All - American team because of the present - day system of using two teams , an offensive and a defensive unit . " It was the International News Service ( the wire service operated by the Hearst newspapers ) that in 1948 became the first to break with tradition by naming separate All - American teams on offense and defense . The INS described its decision in its article announcing the selections : " The days of selecting 11 men on an All - American first team are over , until such time as the unlimited substitution rules are altered . INS thus picks its All - America as the game is now played with the 22 man squad divided into an offensive team and a defensive team . " INS sports editor , Lawton Carver , wrote that the " era of the iron man in football is rapidly passing , " as an increasing number of players were being " tutored and geared to specialize for offense or defense and must be recognized for the part they play . " Consensus All - Americans . Doak Walker of Southern Methodist University received more votes than any other athlete in the 1948 All - American voting . He was also the recipient of the 1948 Heisman Trophy , and was later inducted into both the College and Pro Football Halls of Fame . The chart below reflects the published vote total from the UP poll , and also reflects the number of polls in which the leading candidates were selected as a first - team All - American , and their point total for the top five players in the 1948 Heisman Trophy voting . All - American selections for 1948 . Key . Bold = Consensus All - American