Has Miami found their next star QB?

For the first time in YEARS, Miami has real quarterback competition. Whilst 6th year senior D’Eriq King will be the guy for 2021, there is real speculation of who is up next. 2nd year freshman Tyler Van Dyke has gained much hype during the offseason based upon his performance during camp and scrimmages. In the eyes of many, the Four-Star Pro-Style Quarterback is the popular pick to be the Hurricanes go-to guy for years to come. However, Van Dyke is not the only one making noise in the QB room. Jake Garcia, a once Five-Star rated QB, flipped from USC to Miami this past December and is already turning heads of Miami fans.

Miami held it’s official Spring Game over a week ago giving the Hurricanes fan base their first opportunity to see Garcia play live, which did not disappoint. Garcia went 19/25 on passes, threw for 255 yards and 2 touchdowns on the day. He made a series of amazing passes especially when finding Keyshawn Smith and Mike Harley for TD’s. It was also really cool to see D’Eriq King calling plays for Garcia too, showing his veteran leadership on the sideline while recovering from his ACL tear.

Garcia looked very strong in the pocket, keeping his eyes down field during passing plays. He looked very smooth on his deep ball giving his receivers time to locate and adjust. A big reason I favored him over TVD in the Spring Game was due to Jake’s ability to move up in the pocket and make harder throws. While TVD had himself a spectacular day as well, on some of his tough throws he threw off his back foot instead of setting his feet up. I don’t think this was a huge issue because it only happened a few times and he still made great plays out of it.

On two of Garcia’s big throws to Mark Pope and Dee Wiggins (a drop by Wiggins), Garcia had a tendency of staring down his primary target. I think this is an area Jake will be able to improve easily as he continues to adjust to the college atmosphere and get more familiar with the playbook and his secondary and tertiary reads..

It will be very exciting to see how Garcia progresses as summer arrives. The future at QB for Miami is possibly in as good of a spot now than it’s been in over 10 years. Keep an eye out for younger Hurricanes receiving more reps with starters.