Max Olson
By Max Olson
When you're a veteran college quarterback transferring to your fourth
school in six years, you know what to expect if you check the internet
comments.
He's still around? Geez.
Isn't he like 30 years old?
He needs to move on with his life. He isn't going to the league.
It's time to hit LinkedIn and get a job.
And yet, despite the haters, we've reached a peak moment for
journeyman quarterbacks across college football. Freshmen who began
college in 2020 during the COVID pandemic were granted an extra year
of eligibility by the NCAA. Now they're still hanging around as sixth-year
seniors. Nearly 40 quarterbacks from the 2020 class came back this
year for one more season at the FBS level.
They're 23- and 24-year-old grizzled veterans who feel even older
inside their locker rooms. They have college degrees. Their partying
days are done. They're training and preparing like pros, trying to
squeeze every last drop out of their college days.
College football today is in many ways unrecognizable compared to
when they were high schoolers. The explosion of NIL and the transfer
portal, big-name coach firings, conference realignment, the expanded
College Football Playoff, the pandemic, collectives, agents, revenue
sharing -- you name it, these quarterbacks went through it.
"Not a lot of people have experienced this type of roller-coaster ride in
college football," SMU quarterback Tyler Van Dyke said.
The days of QBs bouncing from school to school for starting jobs aren't
going away. In this new era of unlimited transfers, 85% of top-50
quarterback recruits from 2018 to 2021 have transferred and more than
40% have switched schools multiple times. But we are nearing the end
of the road for a historic fraternity of super seniors granted additional
eligibility because of the pandemic.
This is the story of four journeyman quarterbacks -- Chandler Morris,
Robby Ashford, Drew Pyne and Van Dyke -- still chasing glory in Year 6.
Chandler Morris: Oklahoma | TCU | North Texas | Virginia
Chandler Morris was ready to retire from football. After four years of
setbacks, he'd had enough.
"Football just wasn't loving me back," Morris said. "It's kind of hard to
love something if it's not loving you back."
He started fighting those thoughts two years ago at TCU. Midway
through his first full season as a starter, Morris hurt his left knee and
was sidelined for four games. Young backup Josh Hoover stepped in to
replace him. Morris got healthy but never got his starting job back, and
he couldn't understand why.
By then, though, little had gone according to plan. Morris had initially
committed to play for his father, Chad Morris, at Arkansas. Five months
later, Arkansas fired his dad. The younger Morris responded to that gut
punch by signing with Oklahoma. He arrived in Norman in the summer
of 2020, amid the COVID outbreak, knowing nothing would seem
normal.
There wasn't much bonding time with his freshman class. Gathering
outside the football facility was discouraged. Players were taking online
courses in their dorms, masking up, testing for COVID daily and trying
to get through a college football season played in empty stadiums.
"I don't know if I was very happy there," Morris said. "But I don't know if
there was a happy freshman anywhere in the country that year."
After a season behind Spencer Rattler and with Caleb Williams on the
way, Morris had a sense Oklahoma wasn't the right fit. He transferred
home to TCU to play for Gary Patterson. Eight games into the 2021
season, Patterson's successful 21-year tenure ended abruptly when he
was fired on Halloween. The next day, Morris learned he'd make his first
career start.
The Horned Frogs had nothing to lose against No. 12-ranked rival
Baylor, and that's exactly how Morris played. He lit up one of the Big
12's best defenses with 461 passing yards, 70 rushing yards and 3
touchdowns in a shocking 30-28 upset.
"I was probably too young for that success," Morris said. "I probably
thought I had arrived. I went out there and just dominated them. I was
kind of like an overnight success."
Morris was no less dominant the following August in his preseason
competition with senior Max Duggan. TCU coaches still swear to this
day it wasn't a close call. Morris earned the right to be QB1 as the Frogs
kicked off the Sonny Dykes era. But he didn't make it through the
season opener, exiting with an MCL sprain in his left knee after a
Colorado defender landed on his leg.
"Max took it over," Morris said, "and the rest was history."
A few weeks later, when Duggan led a 55-24 blowout win over
Oklahoma, Morris went home and cried. He knew he'd missed his
chance. TCU went on a surprising 13-1 run to the CFP national
championship game, with Duggan finishing runner-up for the Heisman
Trophy. Morris enjoyed going on that wild ride, but it wasn't easy to set
personal feelings aside. He badly wanted to be out there playing.
Everything finally seemed aligned for Morris entering 2023. The Horned
Frogs got off to a nightmare start with a home loss to Colorado they
never saw coming, but Morris settled in from there and was playing well
until another MCL sprain shut him down. Dykes and his coaches went
with Hoover to finish a rough 5-7 season. Morris felt he was being
pushed out the door.
Chad Morris knew how frustrated and hurt his son was -- and how
seriously he was contemplating retirement -- but urged him to give it one
more shot. North Texas offered a fresh start. Chandler finished his
degree at TCU in the spring of 2024, taking four classes as a regular
student and staying away from football. He needed the time off to reset.
"I learned not to put my identity into football," Morris said. "I think it's
easier said than done when that's all you do. I had my identity wrapped
up in that, and once it got stripped away from me, I was in a low place."
North Texas coach Eric Morris (no relation) watched his QB get his
swagger back last season. Chandler credits his coaches for fully
tailoring the Mean Green offense to his strengths and preferences.
"They poured so much confidence into me," he said. Morris went in
thinking 2024 would be his final college season. Then he put up 4,016
total yards, seventh most in FBS, and had $1 million offers coming in
from Power 4 programs.
If Morris was going to move back up for his sixth year, he wanted to be
around good people. He trusted Virginia coach Tony Elliott, who had
worked with his dad at Clemson. He knew Virginia was loading up on
transfers and going all-in for 2025. Once he got on campus and saw the
personnel, he knew the team could compete.
"You can't ask for much more than an opportunity to come to a place
like this and try to get 'em back on the map," he said.
Nothing about the Cavaliers' 8-1 start and rise to No. 12 in the AP poll,
their highest ranking since 2004, has surprised their QB. Their double-
overtime triumph over then-No. 8 Florida State got everyone's attention,
and they've survived two more overtime thrillers since. When asked if
this team is giving him 2022 TCU vibes, Morris didn't hesitate.
"I really do compare it to that year, just based off our locker room and
how close and how hungry we are," Morris said. "They've lost quite a bit
of games over the years. They're ready to be done with that."
Even on a seven-game win streak, nothing comes easy. Morris has
battled a shoulder injury for most of the season. Elliott says he's been a
"warrior" throughout. After everything Morris has gone through, good
luck convincing him to miss a single snap of this ACC title chase.
"I wouldn't pick to be in college football for six years," Morris said, "but
here I am."
Robby Ashford: Oregon | Auburn | South Carolina | Wake Forest
For Wake Forest quarterback Robby Ashford, the trials of the past six
years have felt beyond his control.
"I wouldn't necessarily say I'm trash, because I've been to four Power 4
schools," Ashford joked. "I can't be that bad. It's just been situations I
couldn't handle. I went through a lot of things I couldn't really do
anything about."
He was committed to Ole Miss back in 2019, the same year Elijah
Moore pretended to urinate in the end zone during the Egg Bowl.
Rebels coach Matt Luke was in Hoover, Alabama, visiting Ashford when
he got the call and realized he was getting fired.
Ashford had little time to pick his next school and moved across the
country to play both football and baseball at Oregon. If the 2020 MLB
draft hadn't been cut from 40 rounds down to five due to COVID, the
former top-200 draft prospect might have picked pro baseball out of high
school.
After two seasons as a backup QB in Eugene, Ashford was eager to
play. But then Mario Cristobal left for Miami, Dan Lanning took over and
his new offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham brought in Bo Nix.
Ashford hit the portal and went home to Auburn. He found a coach who
believed in him in Bryan Harsin, and he became a starter three games
into the 2022 season.
During his first start against Missouri, Ashford seriously injured his
throwing shoulder: second-degree AC joint sprain, bruised rotator cuff,
sprained trap muscle. He played hurt for nine games, not saying a word
about it publicly until the season ended.
"I was getting four shots a game in my shoulder and neck to be able to
play," he said. "I wasn't going to tell anybody so teams wouldn't hammer
my shoulder. The only people who really know are with you every day.
They can't go out there and tell everybody, 'Bro, y'all don't understand,
Robby is hurt. He's playing with a messed-up shoulder.' But that gave
everybody a perception about me.”
After a four-game slide, Auburn fired Harsin. The backlash Ashford
experienced during that 5-7 season was unlike anything he anticipated.
He knew all about the passion in the SEC, but nothing prepares a 20-
year-old for an inbox full of racial slurs and death threats after losses.
Ashford said it wasn't just direct messages on social media; he'd get
texts from unknown numbers too.
"You try not to look at it, but sometimes it pops up while you're
scrolling," he said. "It's like you can't get away from it, even when you're
not trying to search for it. That's part of it that comes with being a Black
quarterback."
Ashford didn't want to show his face on campus. He knows he played
too timid, too nervous about making matters worse.
"It gets to the point where you almost have to start worrying about your
personal safety," he admitted. His father, Robert, encouraged him to
keep his head up and keep trusting it would work out.
Ashford gave up baseball in the spring of 2023, a sacrifice he was
willing to make to prove to new Auburn coach Hugh Freeze he was
focused on leading the Tigers. He felt great about his performance in
spring practice and was the spring game offensive MVP. Weeks later,
Freeze landed transfer QB Payton Thorne from Michigan State.
"I got backdoored," Ashford said. "I got my job taken without losing it. If I
would've known I was going to lose my job without playing bad, I
would've played baseball. You live and learn."
Ashford hadn't graduated and couldn't leave. He backed up Thorne for a
season before moving on and was glad to get out.
"It felt like a toxic environment," Ashford said.
He moved on to South Carolina, believing it was important to stay in the
SEC, but lost an offseason competition to LaNorris Sellers. Ashford
remembers his first time meeting the redshirt freshman who wore
glasses even with his helmet on.
"I was like, 'You're the kid that's, like, really good?'" Ashford recalls with
a laugh. "It just don't seem like it when you meet him. Then he gets on
that field and, yeah, you're the kid that's really good."
Ashford mentored and pushed Sellers as he became a breakout star for
the Gamecocks. He wasn't thrilled about his backup role but had
nothing but love for Sellers, whom he considers a little brother. With one
season left, Ashford reentered the portal seeking an opportunity.
Wake Forest had a new coaching staff and needed a veteran starter.
Ashford suspects he might be the lowest-paid QB1 in the Power 4, but
he doesn't care. He just wanted to play.
Ashford is right where he wanted to be, but it's been a tough year. His
father passed away suddenly at the age of 53 in April. He's still working
through the grief, and it hit him hard 15 minutes before his first Wake
Forest start.
"He'd been there for me through the ups and downs," Robby said. "I
was hoping he got to see this year."
Robby continues to tough it out without him. He's trying to lead this 5-3
team despite an injured thumb on his throwing hand. Ashford and
backup Deshawn Purdie pulled off a 13-12 upset of SMU in Week 9, but
they had few answers for Florida State's defense in a 42-7 loss
Saturday.
Ashford hasn't stopped believing, even in Year 6, that his best football is
still ahead of him.
"There's been a lot of days where it's like, man, why is this going on?"
he said. "But it's kind of brought me a great sense of hope, just to know
I can keep going. I've gotta keep going."
Drew Pyne: Notre Dame | Arizona State | Missouri | Bowling Green
Drew Pyne's legendary Connecticut high school football coach, Lou
Marinelli, had a saying that stuck with the quarterback: Football is just
like life, but sped up.
For Pyne, the college football journey began incredibly early. He
received scholarship offers as an eighth grader back in 2016, thanks to
a highlight tape of his mom's Pop Warner footage cut together on
iMovie. Pyne threw at an Alabama camp and suddenly had an offer from
Nick Saban.
"I kinda stopped being a kid in eighth grade after that," Pyne said.
The kid who grew up quickly in a Catholic family committed to his dream
school, Notre Dame, as a high school sophomore. Ian Book took Pyne
under his wing during Pyne's freshman year in 2020 as the Fighting
Irish rolled through a bizarre season in the ACC to the College Football
Playoff and a Rose Bowl semifinal played in Texas.
Pyne went in for two snaps against No. 1 Alabama and saw eight future
NFL draft picks on the other side of the ball. He couldn't wait to lead the
Irish back to that big stage.
After another year of waiting behind Jack Coan, Pyne felt ready. Tyler
Buchner won the starting job entering 2022 but suffered a shoulder
injury. In the first quarter of his first start in South Bend, Pyne
accidentally went viral. The NBC broadcast captured offensive
coordinator Tommy Rees cursing out his QB from the coaches' box after
three poor drives. Welcome to the big leagues.
Pyne's run as the starting quarterback of the Fighting Irish, the goal he'd
chased his whole life, lasted just 10 games. A four-loss season in Year 1
under Marcus Freeman wasn't the goal for a team with preseason top-
five expectations. But Pyne did go 8-2 as a starter with victories over
Clemson, North Carolina, Syracuse and BYU.
"I'm real proud of my time there," Pyne said. "I still root for Notre Dame
and Coach Freeman, who was great to me. I'm still best friends with a
lot of those guys. It's a great place. I loved it there."
So why leave? By the end of the season, it was clear Freeman and
Rees wanted a transfer QB to push or replace Pyne and Buchner. Pyne
was one semester away from graduating and hoped to become a
captain in 2023, but he was informed there'd be a competition. He
sensed the odds were stacked against him and exited before the bowl
game to hunt for his next home.
Pyne transferred to Arizona State. And then Missouri. And now Bowling
Green. He didn't expect this many twists and turns.
"Going in, I never wanted to transfer or do any of that," Pyne said. "But
that's just the way the tide flows in today's game. I love football and I
want to play football. That's why I've done what I've done."
At Arizona State, he teamed up with Dillingham to try to lead a revival. A
pulled hamstring during a preseason scrimmage was the first setback.
Pyne came back several weeks early -- refusing to miss a rematch with
Caleb Williams after losing to USC in his Notre Dame finale -- with the
help of daily sessions in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber.
"All I wanted to do was to play Caleb again and try to beat him," Pyne
said. "So I said screw it, I don't care if my leg falls off, I'm going to play
in that USC game."
And how'd that go?
"I popped my left groin, separated my AC joint, got a pinched nerve in
my neck and got sacked eight times -- but we took 'em to the fourth
quarter," he said. "Let me tell you, the next morning was pretty tough."
Pyne's season was over. He'd wake up at 4:30 a.m. each day to go in
for physical therapy. He'd get down on himself as doubt crept in. And he
didn't know what to do next.
He returned to Notre Dame, reenrolling for the spring to take the final
classes needed for his degree. Pyne worked out with a local trainer and
hoped someone would take a chance on him.
Missouri brought in Pyne to back up senior Brady Cook. He had to
relieve an injured Cook against Alabama and threw three interceptions
in a 34-0 loss. What stuck with him, though, was the way Luther Burden
III and fellow teammates kept encouraging him. "They know I try as
hard as I can," Pyne said. "Those guys had my back."
He rewarded their faith the following week against Oklahoma, guiding a
75-yard touchdown drive late in the fourth quarter to tie it up. Less than
a minute later, Missouri defensive end Zion Young scooped up a fumble
and scored to stun the Sooners.
"I was on the bench saying a prayer," Pyne said. "I go, 'God, I feel like
things don't go my way all the time. Can you please let something go
my way?' And then, boom, I look up and Zion's running in for the
touchdown."
After one of the proudest nights of his life, Pyne wanted to chase that
feeling in 2025. He joined Bowling Green because he was sold on new
coach Eddie George and the culture he's building. Pyne knows a thing
or two about winning over a new team by now, but this group embraced
its 24-year-old captain.
When Pyne made his fifth trip to the Manning Passing Academy this
summer, Archie Manning named him captain of the college QBs. After
all, he'd roomed with Brock Purdy in his first year.
"Now I'm the old head," he said.
Pyne is going through more trying times this season. He just returned to
action Saturday in a loss to Buffalo after missing three games with a leg
injury. The Falcons are 3-6 and trying to get back on track to chasing
bowl eligibility in November.
Believe it or not, thanks to the Arizona State injury, Pyne has one more
season of eligibility in 2026 if he wants it. He hasn't decided, saying his
life could go in a million directions after this year. At the moment, he's
just grateful for what he found at Bowling Green.
"It's really all you could ask for, especially for a guy like me at the tail
end of my career, being a starter, a leader and a captain," Pyne said.
"It's like playing Road to Glory, but in real life."
Tyler Van Dyke: Miami | Wisconsin | SMU
Entering the 2022 season, some were calling Tyler Van Dyke, the
reigning ACC Rookie of the Year, a first-round NFL draft talent alongside
Bryce Young and C.J. Stroud.
"It was a lot of praise, but I believed it," Van Dyke said, "I thought I was
that good. And I know I'm that good when I'm healthy and playing my
best."
Young and Stroud are now third-year NFL starters. Van Dyke is still
fighting to get back on their level. He's off the national radar for now, a
backup at SMU recovering from a significant leg injury and preparing for
one more chance.
Van Dyke reunited with Rhett Lashlee, the coach who gave him so
much confidence as a redshirt freshman subbing for injured starter
D'Eriq King at Miami. Now King is his position coach. They went on a
good run together in 2021, but it wasn't enough to save Manny Diaz's
job. New coach Mario Cristobal offered effusive praise for the
quarterback he inherited, comparing Van Dyke to Justin Herbert and
declaring there wasn't a better QB in the country.
But at the end of 2022, Van Dyke wasn't ready for the NFL. He got a
wake-up call four games in when Cristobal benched him during an ugly
loss to Middle Tennessee. "Everything's not rainbows and butterflies like
2021," Van Dyke said. In the moment, he felt like the fan base was
flipping on him from love to hate.
Van Dyke started meeting with a sports psychologist to talk it out and
clear his head. He threw for 496 yards in his next start, a close loss to
Drake Maye and North Carolina, and felt back on track after a road win
at Virginia Tech. Then he suffered a third-degree AC joint sprain in his
throwing shoulder, forcing him to sit out most of the final five games.
After a disappointing 5-7 season, Van Dyke considered leaving Miami.
In the spring of 2023, Alabama tried to persuade Van Dyke to transfer.
And he was listening.
"To be honest, I was pretty much all-in on going there," Van Dyke said.
The Crimson Tide had lost Young to the NFL and were unsure of what
they had in Jalen Milroe. Van Dyke said Rees, then the OC at Alabama,
tried to recruit him to Notre Dame to replace Pyne. Now he was circling
back. For Van Dyke, it wasn't a financial decision. The NIL money back
then was nothing like it is today. This was about his future. A great year
at Alabama could get him back to first-round status.
But he didn't transfer. Cristobal found out about the Alabama talks and
convinced him to stay. Van Dyke doesn't know how that leaked out, but
he was in a tough spot and ultimately preferred to stick with his team.
"I felt good about it at the end of the day," Van Dyke said. "I didn't want
to move. I had a lot of friends on that team. I was the leader of the team.
Everybody loved me and I loved the team. I wanted to stay at Miami."
The Hurricanes started 4-0 in 2023 before a baffling loss to Georgia
Tech, eschewing victory formation to close out a win and fumbling away
the game. Van Dyke got hurt the following week against North Carolina,
a bruise on his knee that spread to his quad. He tried to play through
the rare leg ailment, called a Morel-Lavallée lesion, but wasn't close to
his best and finished with 14 turnovers. It was clearly time to move on.
The weekly unpredictability of those last two Miami seasons wore him
out. The Canes would win and feel like contenders. They'd lose and, to
Van Dyke, it felt like the end of the world. He says he has a lot of
respect for Cristobal, but the situation deteriorated over time.
"It ended up not working out for both of us," Van Dyke said.
Miami replaced him with a future No. 1 pick in Cam Ward. For Van
Dyke, it stung to see all the effusive praise for Ward's leadership last
year come with unsubtle digs at the previous QB.
"Leadership is easy when everything's going well," he said. "It's easy to
blame someone, it's easy to put that scapegoat on someone, when
things go wrong. It was a tough year. I felt like that was a narrative on
me that was so unnecessary and ridiculous. Even some coaches who
recruited me in the portal were questioning my leadership.
"I remember Cristobal, when the Alabama situation came up, saying to
me: 'You mean more than you know to this team. You're the guy.
Everybody looks up to you.' He said that to my face. After that, for all
them to question my leadership? That one hurt a little bit."
Van Dyke was relieved to have a dozen offers in the portal, and he
called Lashlee for advice. Wisconsin felt like the right fit for 2024, a Big
Ten program where he could win and revive his draft stock. Three
games in, Van Dyke got to face Alabama.
He tried scrambling on a third down to extend the Badgers' opening
drive. His right foot got stuck in turf as a defender slammed him down
along the sideline. Had he known officials threw a flag for defensive
holding, Van Dyke would've walked out of bounds. Instead, he fought for
extra yards and it cost him the season.
Van Dyke didn't just tear the ACL in his right knee and his meniscus. He
also damaged cartilage at the bottom of his femur, which required three
allograft plugs. The injuries meant a more than 12-month recovery
timeline. He spent two long months on crutches watching the Badgers
stumble to 5-7, wondering if he'd ever play another snap.
Van Dyke went back in the portal. Lashlee and King offered what he
needed most: a place to rehabilitate with the people he trusts most.
Lashlee didn't bring him to Dallas to be SMU's starter or backup for
2025. He was giving his former QB an opportunity to recover with full
support and no pressure.
"Some guys on the team when they first met me, they were like, 'Oh my
god, you were at Miami. You were good at Miami,'" Van Dyke says with
a chuckle. "I'd say, 'Yeah...'"
It's an odd experience, taking a backseat when you've been a starter for
four years. Van Dyke is suiting up for games and is close to being
cleared, but he's there to support starter Kevin Jennings. He's offering
tips in film sessions and charting plays during games as he ponders
getting into coaching after he's done playing.
Van Dyke is working toward his big comeback and returning for a
seventh year in 2026. He's determined to start again, whether that's at
SMU or elsewhere, but he's happy where he is these days. He'll turn 25
in March. He's getting married next summer. That's all he knows for
now.
"In the past, I would always look at my future like if I don't do this, this
and this, it's not going to work out for me," Van Dyke said. "Now I'm
taking it one day at a time."
The book on his career isn't closed yet. The veteran passer grins when
he considers what people will say about his journey extending into Year 7.
"It's going to surprise a lot of people that I'm still in college," Van Dyke said.
"But everyone has a different story to tell."
JUDGE'S COMMENTS: "On QBs who have lengthy stories to tell about why they’re still hanging around for fifth, sixth
and even seventh seasons in college football. Not only topical (meeting a specific juncture in the game five years
after COVID) but painstakingly reported. The author chose his four principal characters well and captured their old souls.The subjects were clearly listened to and understood. The author didn’t need to fabricate cheap pathos; the emotions exuded through selected quotes are often raw but also often conflicted. Beautifully crafted and written with subtle sensitivity."
OLSON'S BIO: Max began his journalism career in 2012 after graduating from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He covered Texas football, the Big 12 and recruiting at ESPN for six years before joining The Athletic when it launched its college football vertical in 2017. He returned to ESPN as a national college football writer in 2024. His current role focuses on the transfer portal, NIL and telling stories about the trends and the people shaping the future of this rapidly evolving sport. Max lives in Lincoln, Neb., with his wife and two children.
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