updated 8:02 p.m. ET Dec. 10, 2005

AUSTIN, Texas - Texas quarterback Vince Young started his own Heisman campaign Monday.

After a season of deflecting Heisman questions to focus on getting the Longhorns to the Rose Bowl, Young finally had some answers, saying voters should look at his leadership and that he sat on the bench in the second half of several Texas blowouts this season.

Second-ranked Texas (12-0) and No. 1 USC (12-0) will play for the BCS championship Jan. 4. The Heisman Trophy ceremony is Saturday.

And while Young leads a team riding a 19-game winning streak, he knows he may be running second to dynamic Trojans tailback Reggie Bush.

“I think my chances are real high if they watch the game, how I’m a leader for my teammates. I hope they will see that the numbers that I put up were basically in the first half,” Young said. “In the second half I’m basically on the bench. I hope they look at that.

“If I played a full game I would have some more stats. Coach (Mack) Brown, he don’t like to blow out people so he pulled basically all our starters on the bench.”

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Young passed for 2,769 yards and 26 touchdowns and ran for a team-high 850 yards and nine TDs this season in a Texas offense that scored 50 or more points seven times. The pass efficiency rating for a quarterback who was told he couldn’t throw is a nation-leading 168.6.

But he also knows that Bush captured many voters with huge games at the end of the season against Fresno State and UCLA. Many consider Bush’s 513 total yards against Fresno State the top performance of the season. Young had his own 506-yard game against Oklahoma State.

“If they’re just looking for the big, big highlights, then you got Bush winning,” Young said. “He is a great athlete, though.”

If he wins Saturday, Young would join running backs Earl Campbell (1977) and Ricky Williams (1998) as Texas Heisman Trophy winners.

If he doesn’t win Saturday, Young said it will motivate him even more to have a big game at the Rose Bowl, “to go out there and show the world they made a wrong decision. You’ve got to do that.”

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