The quarterback competition between Trace McSorley and Tommy Stevens is Storyline 1A of this Saturday’s Blue-White Game.
Storyline 1B is Penn State’s fast-paced new spread offense.
The two go hand-in-hand. And, right now, McSorley has the upper hand.
Feet-wise, McSorley – who runs a 4.58 for the 40 – is quicker and a bit more elusive when he’s in inside traffic. But once Stevens is on the edge, he knows how to hoof it.
In the head-for-the-game department, McSorley may also have a bit of an edge. He ran a variation of the spread offense in high school. And he’s been in college ball longer, and all that entails – from practice time to film study to leadership – may actually be his strongest suit.
Here’s what McSorley did in high school running an uptempo offense for Briar Woods in Northern Virginia: He started as a freshman and took his team to four state championship games, winning three. He threw for 9,981 career yards and ran for 2,072 more, for 12,053 total yards – second all-time in Virginia. His 693 career completions are a Virginia record and his 149 total touchdowns (111 passing, 38 running) rank No. 3 all-time.
McSorley will be a junior in the fall, while Stevens will be a sophomore. McSorley was the No. 2 QB behind Christian Hackenberg last season. As such, he appeared in seven games in 2015, completing 20 of 40 for 185 yards, with two TD passes, and 13 rushes for 43 yards – for a very decent 3.3-yards per carry average. McSorley excelled in extended relief in the TaxSlayer Bowl against Georgia, throwing two fourth-quarter touchdown passes while completing 14 of 27 for 142 yards overall. Not to mention seven carries for 31 yards.
Given all that, though, the two-man race for the starting job has more of the feel of a competition than a controversy. Franklin has worked hard to keep the battle royale components of the situation to a minimum.
In part, it’s because the Nittany Lions’ offense is new, as is its offensive coordinator. When Joe Moorhead came aboard and brought a new offense and a new philosophy, the starting line for the two-man race for the starting quarterback job – with apologies to first-semester freshman QB Jake Zembiec – became closer than had John Donovan not been fired.
DECISION TIME(FRAME)
Entering spring drills, Franklin said he was in no hurry to pick a starter at quarterback. To make a decision, he said he’d need all 15 official practices of the spring (No. 15 is Saturday’s game) and maybe a chunk more of the 29 summer practice sessions prior to the Sept. 3 season opener vs. Kent State).
“I think you always would like to have your quarterback named as early as possible, so they can go into the summer and really kind of take ahold of the team,” Franklin said a few weeks ago. “But we don’t want to rush the decision because of that.
“We want to make the right decision, No. 1, and if that becomes obvious very early on, great. If it needs to go to summer camp, we’re willing to go to summer camp. If it needs to be the first game (and) you are waiting for us to announce the starter, that could be the case as well.”
Last week, though, Franklin said McSorley is, as expected, ahead of Stevens. For good reason.
“The experience, reps, the fact that he’s been the No. 2 for a full year,” Franklin said of McSorley. “You’ve got to prepare like you’re the starter. But when you’re redshirting and you’re the No. 2 quarterback and could go in at any point, you prepare differently.”
Franklin, however, quickly issued this caveat: “It doesn’t really matter who’s ahead right now in practice No. 7 of spring ball,” Franklin said. “It really matters where they are maybe halfway through (fall) camp, if it takes that long to decide.”
RECENT HISTORY
In these parts lately, that decision has been made early.
In 2012, as soon as Bill O’Brien got in a meeting room with Matt McGloin, Rob Bolden and Paul Jones, and saw them to do some work drawing up a new offense on the whiteboard, the decision was made. Matt was No. 1. It wasn’t announced until June 1, but it was all but decided back in February before they ever set foot on the practice field.
(McGloin, ever the competitor, always did well in the Blue-White Game. In his four years of playing in the intrasquad scrimmage, McGloin was 30 of 59 for 435 yards, with five TDs and three picks. Bolden, on the other hand, was 7 of 19 with four interceptions.)
In 2013, it took Steven Bench – who as a freshman was McGloin’s backup in 2012 – all of five days to announce his transfer after the Blue-White Game. In the April 20 contest he completed 9 of 15 for 99 yards with a TD pass, while Tyler Ferguson was 9 of 15 for 90 yards, with two touchdown passes. On April 24, after a heart-to-heart conversation with O’Brien, Bench announced that he was transferring.
Even though he was not yet on campus, the odds of Hackenberg – as a freshman – earning the starting job in 2013 were good. And they stayed that way for 38 games, through the 2014 and ’15 spring games. (BTW: McSorley was held out of and did not play in last year’s Blue-White Game, while Stevens was 3 of 11 for 19 yards.)
Which leads us to Saturday. We may see numbers akin to the 1980 contest, when the Nittany Lions had their biggest springtime quarterback competition – and controversy – ever: Todd Blackledge vs. Jeff Hostetler vs. Frank Rocco.
It truly was a three-man race, and Blackledge entered spring at the bottom of the rung. By the end of the May 3 Blue-White Game, he had moved up quite a bit. He was 14 of 31 for 256 yards, with two interceptions and two TDs. Hostetler was 14 of 26 for 223, with a touchdown run, while Rocco was 10 of 24 for 101 yards, with one interception — a pick by his brother Dan on the game’s first play. Hostetler got the starting nod for the first three games of the 1980 regular season, then Blackledge stepped in and went 29-3 over a three-year span that culminated in Penn State’s first national championship in 1982.
It was the best QB battle in PSU history: Blackledge earned the ring and was a first-round NFL draft pick, while Hostler transferred to West Virginia, where he had a successful college career, married the head coach’s daughter and eventually won a Super Bowl quarterbacking the New York Giants.
INTRASTATE EARLY
Franklin could go that way and use the first few games of the 2016 season to settle on his starter. However, that’s a tough row to hoe. Crucial back-to-back intrastate games against Pitt and Temple follow Penn State’s opener.
More likely, at some point in August Franklin will name his starting quarterback – only the second one in Franklin’s three seasons as head coach at Penn State.
If it’s McSorley, there is a good chance that Franklin’s rationale will sound like O’Brien’s back in June 2012.
“He (McGloin) was the most consistent guy throughout the spring,’ O’Brien said at the time. “He has good command of the offense at this point. He’s a tough kid. He’s a competitive kid. He’s shown good leadership qualities. I just felt like he is the No. 1 quarterback.”
