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2026 NIU Football Roster

5 Taron Dickens

  • Height 5-11
  • Weight 180
  • Class Redshirt Junior
  • Position Quarterback
  • Hometown Miami, Fla.
  • High School Northwestern HS
  • Prev School Western Carolina

Biography

2025 (Western Carolina)
  • First-Team All-Southern Conference selection and runner up for the 2025 Walter Payton Award.
  • Awarded the 2025 Roy M. “Legs” Hawley Southern Conference Offensive Player of the Year.
  • Received five postseason All-America honors, including First-Team from Stats Perform FCS, Second-Team from FCS Football Central and AFCA, Third-Team from Phil Steele and honorable mention from the AP.
  • Led the FCS in completion percentage (.742) and passing yards per game (389.78) while placing second in passing touchdowns (38).
  • Set the Southern Conference record for single-season passing touchdowns (38) and passing efficiency (188.24).
  • Completed an NCAA record 46 consecutive passes against Wofford (Oct. 4).
  • Set the NCAA multi-game record with 50-straight pass completions between games against Campbell (Sept. 27) and Wofford (Oct. 4).
  • Passed for a school-record 3,508 yards in nine games with the Catamounts, adding 38 touchdowns against two interceptions while completing .742 percent of attempts.
  • In his first start of the season against Samford on Sept. 20, threw for a career-high 582 yards with six touchdowns on 35-of-46 attempts.
  • Season-high seven touchdown passes against Mercer (Nov. 8) with 551 passing yards.
  • Passed for at least 325 yards in seven of nine games and threw for multiple passing touchdowns in all nine.
  • Recorded four games of 400 or more passing yards and eclipsed four or more passing touchdowns in seven games.
  • Finished season with 7-2 record as a starter while guiding the second-best total offense in the FCS (493.3 yards per game) and seventh-ranked scoring offense (38.6 points per game).
  • Won Southern Conference Offensive Player of the week three times while earning FCS National Offensive Player of the Week five times.
 
2024 (Western Carolina)
  • Appeared in seven games while starting the final four games of the season.
  • Earned All-Freshman Southern Conference honors, was named Third-Team Freshman All-America by Phil Steele and Freshman All-America honoree by FCS Football Central.
  • Finished the season with 1,428 passing yards, 12 touchdowns against three interceptions on .738 completion percentage.
  • In the final four games, averaged 341.5 passing yards per game with multiple passing touchdowns in three.
  • Threw for season-high 431 passing yards and five touchdowns in first start of the season against Chattanooga.
  • Against ETSU (Nov. 9), rushed for two touchdowns while adding 233 passing yards on .706 completion percentage.
  • Completed .811 percent of passes (30-of-37) against VMI (Nov. 16) with 294 passing yards and a pair of touchdowns.
  • Threw for 408 passing yards and three touchdowns on 36-of-46 attempts in final game of the season at Samford (Nov. 23).
  • Finalist for the Jerry Rice Award (most outstanding freshman player in FCS football).
 
2023 (Western Carolina)
  • Played in two games as a true freshman, debuting against Charles Southern (Sept. 23).
  • Threw for 127 passing yards on 4-of-6 attempts and one touchdown on the season.
 
High School
  • Played at Miami Northwestern High School in Florida, winning Florida 6A Player of the Year.
  • Threw for nearly 6,000 yards with 64 touchdowns in final two seasons at Northwestern.

Statistics

Season Statistics

Season Statistics

No statistics available for this season.

Career Statistics

There are no statistics available for this player.