College Football’s Top 3 Quarterbacks
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Pictured here are Tim Tebow of the Florida Gators, Colt McCoy of the Texas Longhorns, and Sam Bradford of the Oklahoma Sooners. These three quarterbacks are slated to be the premier gunslingers of 2009, but you know there will be others that rise up to steal some of the spotlight before the 2009 season is out. Who will win the Heisman? Who will play for their conference championship? For these three NCAA hometown heroes, nothing will satisfy any of them short of the National Championship – and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Colt McCoy has been the starting quarterback for the Texas Longhorns since his freshman year after taking over for Vince Young after the Longhorns won the national championship in 2005. As a true freshman, Colt McCoy was redshirted, leaving him four full years of eligibility remaining in his college career. How do you come out on the field as a freshman quarterback after the departure of the great Vince Young (great in college football, anyways) and a national championship season? Like a true Texas gunslinger, that’s how!
Colt McCoy
Colt’s inaugural season as the Longhorn’s starting QB was a tremendous season which set the bar very high for the coming years at Texas. Unfortunately, he hit a sophomore slump his second year as injuries and disappointments set the tone for the season. Sports Illustrated even elected him one of the “Top 10 Most Disappointing College Players” early in the season, and the trial by fire began for the young general. The season was a struggle throughout, but ended on a good note In the 2007 Holiday Bowl where McCoy led the Longhorns to a 52–34 victory and won the offensive-player MVP award. That was not the season that Longhorn fans had come to expect from their team, or their star young quarterback.
But McCoy came storming back in 2008 with a tremendous season that found the Longhorns ranked within shouting distance of the national championship, even holding the #1 ranking at one point during the season. McCoy set several school records and ended a tremendous season for Texas by leading the Longhorns to a 24–21 victory over Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl. McCoy completed 41-of-59 passes for 414 yards, two touchdowns and one interception. He was named the Offensive Player of the Game for his performance once again.
So here we are coming into the spring game in 2009 and to say the pressure and expectations for McCoy and the Longhorns is tremendously high is an understatement. It’s almost enough to make you throw up just thinking about it. Colt has been through the typical pattern that many current and past players at that elite level go through at one point in their career – the incredibly high expectations in the beginning, the incredible start to what will be the best career ever, the fall from grace and struggle soon after as teams learn to exploit the former unknown’s weaknesses, and the eventual rise back to the top of the heap as the talented quarterback forges his character and masters his trade.
Will the 2009-2010 end with a Heisman for McCoy? A national championship? A hot girlfriend? Oh, you damn well can count on a hot girlfriend! But that’s not gonna be enough to sooth the pain of anything less than a tremendous season for McCoy and the Longhorns – no matter how hot she is.
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