By Adam Cancryn
Houston's Case Keenum is shattering all sorts of NCAA records. But does anyone care?
Thing is, it had nothing to do with 1-2 matchups, or marathon College Gameday parties, or storied programs or predetermined Games of the Century.
No, while the nation watched Alabama-LSU devolve into a 12-round slopfest, history was being made some 60 miles away in Birmingham, in a stadium holding just fewer than 14,000 spectators.
There, Houston quarterback Case Keenum torched the University of Alabama at Birmingham for 407 yards and two touchdowns in a little more than three quarters of a 56-13 win. Keenum completed 88.6% of his passes and hit 11 different receivers. Houston improved to 9-0 and stayed on track toward its first ever undefeated season.
Most notable, though, is that none of those numbers, save for the last one, were anything out of the ordinary.
Keenum has been doing this for the better part of five years now, picking apart defenses with his pinpoint accuracy and preternatural field vision. He has been a one-man offense, the main cog in a single-sentence game plan: throw it 40+ times and see what sticks. More often than not, that playground approach has proven more than adequate.
And so it came to be that, upon completing a 16-yard pass to receiver Justin Johnson on Saturday, Keenum set the record for career passing yards in NCAA history, with 17,212.
It is yet another mind-boggling accomplishment added to a resume that ranks as one of the most distinct in college football. Keenum's name is already etched atop the NCAA charts for career touchdown passes (141), touchdowns accounted for (163), total offense (18,101 yards) and career 300-yard games (34). He is a sixth-year senior, granted a rare extra campaign after he shredded his ACL three games into the 2010 season. He is the even rarer athlete to come back from an ACL tear stronger and more successful than before.
However, as unusual as Keenum's resume is, it is perhaps equally as predictable that it has received little attention within the wider college football world. The Houston Cougars are, of course, a Conference USA team playing in the shadows of the Big 12 and SEC. Keenum is, of course, just the latest in a long line of "system quarterbacks," the scouting equivalent of a four-letter word that is slapped on any passer with gaudy statistics but no national television appearances.
We've seen this story before, at Hawaii and throughout Texas, at Central Michigan and Louisiana Tech and a host of nondescript schools trying to make a splash. We won't be fooled again by big numbers backed by little substance. We'll keep our focus on the so-called "big time" schools; those plotlines are reliable and readymade.
Yet it nevertheless seems like there's something here, nestled in this football-crazed state too distracted by its weekend bender of Friday night lights and burnt orange obsession. While top tier teams UT and Texas A&M flounder, the Houston Cougars are 9-0. They're ranked 11th in the nation. They matter.
So does Keenum, and not just because he is the key to an unbeaten BCS-busting season.
Rather, he is a crusader for lasting credibility among college football's mid-major quarterbacks. He is the latest to try to convince NCAA pollsters and then NFL scouts that there is merit to these video game-like statistics, that they came from real talent and hard work, not a string of showdowns with the Sisters of the Blind.
In that mission, Keenum still faces a mountain of factors he cannot control. Houston has played a number of bona fide patsies, thanks largely to a soft in-conference schedule and exacerbated by a lack of ranked opponents. The Cougars have beaten most handily, but close contests with UCLA and UTEP are deflating. Houston would likely be the lowest ranked undefeated team should current patterns hold, good enough for a BCS bowl but miles away from gaining the kind of legitimacy enjoyed by former mid-major and likely future "big time" program Boise State.
When it comes to the NFL, the mountain grows ever steeper. Keenum is vicimized by a history littered with the remains of "system quarterbacks": B.J. Symons, Colt Brennan, Graham Harrell, Timmy Chang, Tim Rattay are just a few. The list is both long and obscure.
He is also overshadowed by a top-heavy crop of potential draftees headlined by Stanford's Andrew Luck and Oklahoma's Landry Jones. Those ahead of Keenum will have been discussed and dissected and mock drafted thousands of times by the time the 2012 Draft rolls around.
There is not much Keenum can do about all that, though. He can only keep throwing and keep winning. Of all the numbers he's ammassed at Houston, finishing this year 14-0 might be the most crucial of his career.
Maybe then some NFL team will take a late-round chance on him. Then again, if Keenum produces at even a fraction of the pace we've seen the last five years, it might not be so much of a gamble.
1 comments:
so wouldn't a 6th year help a system quarterback to all-time greatness?
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