Joe Burrow’s first season as a graduate transfer quarterback at LSU resulted in a 10-3 record and four triumphs over top-10 opponents.Visit a Southeastern Conference campus these days, and the chances of bumping into a graduate transfer quarterback continue to increase.
As many as five SEC football programs this season – Arkansas, LSU, Mississippi State, Missouri and Vanderbilt – could start quarterbacks who arrived at their respective schools with diplomas in hand. LSU’s Joe Burrow returns as the starter for the Tigers after graduating from Ohio State in May 2018, which is also when Missouri’s Kelly Bryant graduated from Clemson.
Bryant started Clemson’s first four games last season and transferred to Mizzou in December.
“I do not think the trend is going to go away,” Arkansas second-year coach Chad Morris said. “I think this is something that is here to stay and especially at the quarterback position. You can’t blame them, because guys want to play. When you recruit a quarterback, it’s different than recruiting someone else.
“These guys want to play, and they want to be the man. They want to impact the game.”
Arkansas began preseason camp with two graduate transfers, Ben Hicks and Nick Starkel, vying with redshirt freshman John Stephen Jones and true freshman K.J. Jefferson for the starting quarterback role. Hicks arrived from SMU, where he played under Morris and threw for 9,081 yards and 71 touchdowns during 37 career contests with the Mustangs, while Starkel appeared in 11 games the past two seasons with Texas A&M, where he threw for 1,962 yards with 15 touchdowns and six interceptions.
Nick Starkel appeared in 11 games the past two seasons as Texas A&M’s quarterback but switched SEC West schools in the offseason and is now a graduate transfer at Arkansas.None of Starkel’s appearances with the Aggies occurred against Arkansas, so Sept. 28 could be his playing debut in that SEC West rivalry.
Vanderbilt could be replacing four-year starter Kyle Shurmur with Riley Neal, who threw for 7,393 yards and 46 touchdowns the past three seasons at Ball State. Neal entered preseason camp competing with senior Deuce Wallace, who developed an infection under his armpit this spring that allowed Neal to take most of the first-team snaps.
“I know it seems to be prevalent in the SEC, but I think it’s prevalent across college football,” Vandy coach Derek Mason said. “Every team is trying to get better. You see a lot of programs stack up the quarterback position, and guys look up and say, ‘Well, maybe I need to look at a different opportunity.’
“Free agency wasn’t a part of college football two years ago. Now it is, but with that being said, the platform to give the student-athlete an opportunity to find the best fit is something that I’m all for.”
It certainly has created a stir inside those locker rooms with new quarterbacks who have accumulated a wealth of experience elsewhere.
“It’s exciting,” Vanderbilt senior receiver Kalija Lipscomb said. “You let the best guys play, and if Riley is on fire and is clicking with the other guys, then why not let him have a chance to play? He came here to show that he can do it on a big stage.
“I have no dog in the fight. I just want the best guy to play.”
The NCAA’s graduate transfer rule was created in 2005, went away in 2006 and resurfaced in 2011, when it gained instant traction after returning starter Russell Wilson was beaten out by Mike Glennon at North Carolina State and transferred to Wisconsin. Wilson led the Badgers to 11 wins and a Rose Bowl trip during that 2011 season, while Glennon and the Wolfpack finished 8-5 and as Belk Bowl champions.
Graduate transfer quarterbacks have played to mixed reviews so far in the SEC.
Jake Coker transferred from Florida State to Alabama in 2014 and backed up Blake Sims his first season before guiding the 2015 Crimson Tide to the national championship. Greyson Lambert transferred from Virginia to Georgia in 2015 and started that year for the Bulldogs, but he lost the job to freshman Jacob Eason early in the 2016 season. Then there was Keller Chryst, who went 11-2 as Stanford’s starter but transferred to Tennessee last year and never beat out Jarrett Guarantano.
Familiarity certainly can play a role with graduate transfer quarterbacks, given that Hicks played for Morris at SMU and that Mississippi State’s Tommy Stevens arrived from Penn State. Mississippi State second-year coach Joe Moorhead came to Starkville after serving as Penn State’s offensive coordinator.
Stevens played in 20 career games for the Nittany Lions but threw only 41 passes, completing 24 for 304 yards with four touchdowns and an interception. He entered this month vying with Keytaon Thompson, a junior for New Orleans who has two career starts for the Bulldogs.
“Obviously I’ve been exposed to Tommy and coached him for two years at Penn State,” Moorhead said. “I think he brings a lot of talent to the position. It’s going to make the position better. It’s going to make our offense better, and it’s going to make our team better.
“That position is a little bit unique in that, for the most part, only one can play. It’s not like receiver where you play three at a time or O-line where you play five or where you rotate carries between a tailback. There’s one guy that plays, and they want to play.”
Burrow’s success last season in Baton Rouge heightened the spirits of other graduate transfer quarterbacks hoping to make their mark in the SEC. He started all 13 games and led the Tigers to a 10-3 record that contained five wins over Top 25 teams and four over top-10 teams.
Vanderbilt graduate transfer quarterback Riley Neal, who threw for 7,393 yards and 46 touchdowns during his three seasons at Ball State, received most of the first-team work this spring for the Commodores.Completing 219 of 379 passes for 2,894 yards with 16 touchdowns and five interceptions and rushing for 399 yards and seven scores, Burrow saved his best for the Fiesta Bowl. In a 40-32 defeat of Central Florida, he threw for 394 yards and four touchdowns.
Burrow represents another benefit in being a graduate transfer – a very manageable school workload if one desires.
“I kind of just portion out two or three days a week for like an hour that I do all my work,” Burrow said. “The rest of the time is really either at the facility, eating or sleeping.”
Burrow is prepping for another big season but may not be the best of the SEC’s graduate transfer bunch. Bryant started all 14 games for Clemson in 2017, leading the Tigers to the top seed in the college football playoff.
Bryant completed 262 of 398 passes (65.8%) for 2,802 yards with 13 touchdowns and eight interceptions two years ago and was off to a solid start last season – completing 36 of 54 passes (66.7%) for 461 yards and two touchdowns – before being replaced by freshman phenom Trevor Lawrence.
“Right when I put myself in the portal and coaches could contact me, Missouri was the first school that contacted me,” Bryant said. “It was a crazy process. When I went out there on a visit, I just pretty much fell in love with everything that they had to offer.
“The biggest thing for me is that I have one year to get it right. I can’t have any slip-ups.”
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.