The Roadrunners have gone into spring practice with four scholarship QBs on the roster: senior Dalton Sturm, redshirt sophomores Manny Harris and Jaylon Henderson, and true freshman early enrollee Bryce Rivers. Joining them are redshirt freshman walk-on Clay Roberts, who had a very productive career at Houston St. Pius X (he passed for over 5,300 yards and 62 TDs in two seasons as a starter); and undersized redshirt sophomore walk-on transfer Brandon Garza, who passed for over 2,800 yards, 28 TDs and just 4 INTs as a senior at Harlingen and originally signed with Houston as a preferred walk-on in 2014.
The highly-touted hometown hero Frank Harris (Schertz Clemens) will join the team in the summer but almost certainly won't factor into the 2017 playing time picture since he'll be less than a year removed from a pretty serious knee injury he suffered late in the 2016 season.
If that group remained stable at the end of the spring and especially by the end of the 2017 season, it would be hard to imagine UTSA taking more than one QB in the 2018 class. But having that many QBs on the roster with two or more years of eligibility after 2017 practically means it will be a surprise if there's not at least one transfer between now and the end of the year.
So far UTSA has only offered three QBs from the upcoming senior class: Davis Brin (Boerne Champion, #11 on the SA22), Zadock Dinkelmann (Somerset, #13 on the SA22), and LeJohn Howard (McDonough 35 - New Orleans, LA). UTSA seems to be in a good position with Dinkelmann, a former LSU commit, but I can't comment knowledgeably about the recruitment of Brin or Howard. San Antonio is also home to Rivals three-star QB Tyler Vitt of MacArthur, but Javi, Jared and myself were (I believe) unanimous in rating Brin and Dinkelmann above him when we submitted our SA22 lists.
The staff could end up casting a wider net for QBs down the road if they don't like their chances of landing any of those three current offers. I wanted to mention two QBs here who I've become a big fan of and who I think merit a look from the staff, one from the Metroplex, and one from the east coast. I'm interested in what the rest of you think of them.
Alan Bowman (Grapevine) will be in his third year as a starter for his 5A Mustangs this fall. Between his sophomore and junior seasons he passed for 5,930 yards, 69 TDs and just 13 INTs. He shows some scrambling ability and can throw on the run but isn't really a dual-threat type. He has good size at 6'3" 208 and makes some pretty impressive throws in his junior highlights. His recruitment was strangely quiet all fall and for most of the winter but it might finally be picking up steam, as he's been offered by Southern Miss and Arkansas State so far this month. He's bigger than Davis Brin and I'd probably rate him on about the same level, maybe a bit higher.
Justice Galloway-Velazquez (Cape Fear - Fayetteville, NC) is a dual-threat QB who I first learned about two years ago when I was researching for a post I wrote on another site about underrated tight end prospects from around the country. One of those tight ends was a WR/TE from Cape Fear High School in North Carolina who eventually signed with a D2 school, and though I didn't end up writing about him I came away very interested in his school's then-freshman QB. Two years later, Galloway-Velazquez has established himself as one of his state's top prospects, and in 2016 he led his school further than it had ever advanced in the football playoffs, going all the way to the state championship for their classification before losing in a blowout, which is more understandable when you consider that Galloway-Velazquez was playing through a pretty serious ankle injury that severely limited his mobility.
He stands 6'2" and a little over 240 pounds, and every time I watch his highlights I think he must be the most svelte-looking 240-pound QB I've ever seen. In his three seasons as a starting QB he has improved his completion percentage significantly from one season to the next, and as a junior he completed 55% of his passes for 2,476 yards, 26 TDs and 8 INTs, and also rushed 231 times for 1,912 yards and 26 TDs. Had he been healthy for the state championship I think he almost certainly would have finished with 2,000 yards both rushing and passing for the year.
He runs like a much bigger though not quite as quick version of Frank Harris, and I like him as a passer as well. He has at least decent arm strength, and though he might not have a howitzer for an arm I like how patient he is in the pocket and how composed he looks even when facing a pass rush or forced out of the pocket. He will attend East Carolina's junior day next month, and he attended North Carolina State's junior day in January. His head coach tells me he's on the radar of a lot of P5 programs but most have questions about his QB skills (specifically his accuracy) and are hesitant to offer him at that position.
As of a few weeks ago his only offers were from Campbell (FCS) and Fayetteville State (D2). I don't see how that can be possible. Even if one is not sold on him as a college QB, I mean come on! He's 240 pounds and rushed for nearly 2,000 yards last season! He's legitimately big enough and looks quick enough that he could potentially play at TE/H-back or possibly linebacker at the next level, and he has signaled a willingness to change positions in college in interviews with recruiting reporters but clearly his preference is to play QB. North Carolina is way off the path of where UTSA usually recruits from, but the staff has had no issue offering guys in Tennessee, Mississippi, or Georgia. Who knows? Sometimes being a recruit's first FBS offer carries an inordinate amount of weight when he's later deciding on a school. What does everyone else here think?
The highly-touted hometown hero Frank Harris (Schertz Clemens) will join the team in the summer but almost certainly won't factor into the 2017 playing time picture since he'll be less than a year removed from a pretty serious knee injury he suffered late in the 2016 season.
If that group remained stable at the end of the spring and especially by the end of the 2017 season, it would be hard to imagine UTSA taking more than one QB in the 2018 class. But having that many QBs on the roster with two or more years of eligibility after 2017 practically means it will be a surprise if there's not at least one transfer between now and the end of the year.
So far UTSA has only offered three QBs from the upcoming senior class: Davis Brin (Boerne Champion, #11 on the SA22), Zadock Dinkelmann (Somerset, #13 on the SA22), and LeJohn Howard (McDonough 35 - New Orleans, LA). UTSA seems to be in a good position with Dinkelmann, a former LSU commit, but I can't comment knowledgeably about the recruitment of Brin or Howard. San Antonio is also home to Rivals three-star QB Tyler Vitt of MacArthur, but Javi, Jared and myself were (I believe) unanimous in rating Brin and Dinkelmann above him when we submitted our SA22 lists.
The staff could end up casting a wider net for QBs down the road if they don't like their chances of landing any of those three current offers. I wanted to mention two QBs here who I've become a big fan of and who I think merit a look from the staff, one from the Metroplex, and one from the east coast. I'm interested in what the rest of you think of them.
Alan Bowman (Grapevine) will be in his third year as a starter for his 5A Mustangs this fall. Between his sophomore and junior seasons he passed for 5,930 yards, 69 TDs and just 13 INTs. He shows some scrambling ability and can throw on the run but isn't really a dual-threat type. He has good size at 6'3" 208 and makes some pretty impressive throws in his junior highlights. His recruitment was strangely quiet all fall and for most of the winter but it might finally be picking up steam, as he's been offered by Southern Miss and Arkansas State so far this month. He's bigger than Davis Brin and I'd probably rate him on about the same level, maybe a bit higher.
Justice Galloway-Velazquez (Cape Fear - Fayetteville, NC) is a dual-threat QB who I first learned about two years ago when I was researching for a post I wrote on another site about underrated tight end prospects from around the country. One of those tight ends was a WR/TE from Cape Fear High School in North Carolina who eventually signed with a D2 school, and though I didn't end up writing about him I came away very interested in his school's then-freshman QB. Two years later, Galloway-Velazquez has established himself as one of his state's top prospects, and in 2016 he led his school further than it had ever advanced in the football playoffs, going all the way to the state championship for their classification before losing in a blowout, which is more understandable when you consider that Galloway-Velazquez was playing through a pretty serious ankle injury that severely limited his mobility.
He stands 6'2" and a little over 240 pounds, and every time I watch his highlights I think he must be the most svelte-looking 240-pound QB I've ever seen. In his three seasons as a starting QB he has improved his completion percentage significantly from one season to the next, and as a junior he completed 55% of his passes for 2,476 yards, 26 TDs and 8 INTs, and also rushed 231 times for 1,912 yards and 26 TDs. Had he been healthy for the state championship I think he almost certainly would have finished with 2,000 yards both rushing and passing for the year.
He runs like a much bigger though not quite as quick version of Frank Harris, and I like him as a passer as well. He has at least decent arm strength, and though he might not have a howitzer for an arm I like how patient he is in the pocket and how composed he looks even when facing a pass rush or forced out of the pocket. He will attend East Carolina's junior day next month, and he attended North Carolina State's junior day in January. His head coach tells me he's on the radar of a lot of P5 programs but most have questions about his QB skills (specifically his accuracy) and are hesitant to offer him at that position.
As of a few weeks ago his only offers were from Campbell (FCS) and Fayetteville State (D2). I don't see how that can be possible. Even if one is not sold on him as a college QB, I mean come on! He's 240 pounds and rushed for nearly 2,000 yards last season! He's legitimately big enough and looks quick enough that he could potentially play at TE/H-back or possibly linebacker at the next level, and he has signaled a willingness to change positions in college in interviews with recruiting reporters but clearly his preference is to play QB. North Carolina is way off the path of where UTSA usually recruits from, but the staff has had no issue offering guys in Tennessee, Mississippi, or Georgia. Who knows? Sometimes being a recruit's first FBS offer carries an inordinate amount of weight when he's later deciding on a school. What does everyone else here think?
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