Memphis football kicks off the season on Saturday August 29 against UNLV, and the biggest questions about the team revolve around the quarterback position. Charles Huff brought in three quarterbacks during the offseason, and Marcus Stokes and Air Noland have been in a quarterback battle since spring practice.
So, who will be the starting quarterback?
Huff has been very quiet when talking about the topic, and he told reporters over the weekend that the team will know before the first game, but nobody outside of the program will know until the start of the game against the Rebels.
“The team will know before you guys do,” Huff said. “You guys won’t know until they flip the coin, and they say ‘offense up.’ But, the team will know. We’ve told them when we’re going to tell them.”
Huff has said multiple times that he wants to give the starting quarterback enough time to have some practices as the starter before the first game, and on Tuesday, Huff said that the team is set to learn who the starting quarterback is on Sunday.
Grind City Media spent Tuesday at the Billy J. Murphy Athletic Complex, and Huff joined The Chris Vernon Show. The head coach was asked when the team will know who the guy is, and he said that the team will know on Sunday.
“We told them we’d pick a guy the game week,” Huff said. “So, now you have a full week to work as the guy with your unit. You get a change to try some things.”
Huff said that choosing that day to tell the team gave the quarterbacks enough time to compete, but will also give the eventual starter enough time to work with the other starters ahead of the first game.
Stokes and Noland took two different routes to Memphis, but it appears both have the ability to lead the Tigers.
Stokes signed with Memphis after spending three years at West Florida. The quarterback was a four-star recruit out of high school, but he lost nearly all of his scholarship offers after a video went viral of him rapping along to a song and using a racial slur.
As a redshirt sophomore, he threw for 3,297 yards, 30 touchdowns and 13 interceptions, and he added 367 yards and 10 touchdowns with his legs. He helped lead the Argonauts to a 10-2 record and was a finalist for the Harlon Hill Trophy, the Division II equivalent to the Heisman Trophy.
Like Stokes, Noland was also a four-star recruit, and he signed with Ohio State out of high school. Noland didn’t see any action with the Buckeyes and transferred to South Carolina after the season.
With the Gamecocks, he appeared in two games and completed two passes for 13 yards before entering the transfer portal again and landing with the Tigers.
The decision will be made between a quarterback that has a lot of experience at a lower level and a quarterback who has seen limited action as two Power Four programs.
It will be interesting to see who wins the starting job for the Tigers, but the countdown is on until the team finds out who QB1 will be.
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