It’s no secret that teams live and die by their quarterbacks, both at the collegiate and professional level. As Wisconsin fans have endured for years, a team can only go so far on the shoulders of its running backs. When it gets to those crucial third-down situations late in games, teams have to throw the ball, and the ones with the better quarterback usually finish on top.
This was all too evident for the Badgers during the 2014 season, and it came to a pinnacle in the Big Ten Championship thrashing by Ohio State. Redshirt junior quarterback Joel Stave had to throw the ball 43 times in that game, and he completed just under 40 percent of them with three interceptions.
Fast forward to 2015, and Stave starts the spring as the clear-cut, No. 1 quarterback. He was recruited by Paul Chryst, he knows the offense and he is a leader of the team. However, at this point, he is what he is: an experienced but mediocre passer who limits what an offense can do.
Chryst understands this, but he has a track record of putting his quarterbacks in positions to succeed. His quarterbacks systematically finish with a completion percentage over 60 and a healthy touchdown-to-interception ratio. They aren’t asked to do too much, and they lean on their running backs. Chryst knows his players’ limitations, and he focuses on their strengths, like any good coach would do.
It is clear from watching spring practice that he is really committed to putting Stave in that same position to succeed. Chryst knows that his QB can’t throw his receivers open, so what does he do? He leaves his graduate assistant Jon Budmayr to drill the quarterbacks while he goes over and works with wide receivers coach Ted Gilmore for a portion of practice. Chryst is officially the team’s quarterbacks coach, but Budmayr works with the position exclusively and handles them when Chryst is away.
Later, Chryst works his way over to the tight ends and fullbacks. He actually coached tight ends in the NFL for the San Diego Chargers for a few seasons around the turn of the century. Now obviously, he can’t coach every player and every position, but he understands that his receivers need to get separation and run their routes correctly to help Stave succeed.
“I love the way he competes and the way he works,” offensive coordinator Joe Rudolph said of his senior QB. “No matter what your situation is, you’re always at least competing with yourself to kind of get better, to improve and to make adjustments.”
All of this isn’t to say that Stave is guaranteed to be the man under center when the Badgers head to Texas to take on Alabama. Three other quarterbacks are seeing significant snaps at practice, to the point where it is very unclear who the No. 2 is.
Former four-star recruit Bart Houston has been consistently inaccurate and late on his reads, but he’s much more experienced than the other competitors at the position. Early enrollee Alex Hornibrook, a lefty, has made some nice throws to the sideline, but he is struggling so far at reading the coverage over the middle of the field.
The final quarterback competing among this top four is the one to keep an eye on. Coming off a redshirt year, freshman D.J. Gillins is beginning to separate himself from the pack, on and off the field.
“He’s been great,” Budmayr said. “D.J. is a hard worker, and he wants so badly to learn the system and know it inside and out. You appreciate that because he’s just a student of the game.”
His offensive coordinator echoed these sentiments. “I like D.J. a lot, man,” Rudolph said. “I really like his approach. I think he is a guy that gets the most out of things. If he’s in a meeting, he’s grinding, and he’s taking notes on everything.”
On the field, Gillins fired some absolute bullets to receivers over the middle, and he is by far the most mobile of the competing QBs. He definitely needs to work on his footwork, and it is clear that he is still in the process of slowing the game down, but when he is given time to throw and a simplified read, he shows the best arm on the roster by a decent margin.
All of the things that Chryst does to put Stave in the optimal position work just as effectively for Gillins. At this point, Gillins needs his receivers and runners to help him out while he learns the system, just as Stave needs them to make up for his shortcomings.
The team and coaches may be too strongly aligned with Stave to sit their redshirt senior in favor of Gillins, but the redshirt freshman can make the throws that Stave can’t. He’s a dark horse to start in 2015, but he can be the difference maker at quarterback that puts a team over the top, instead of coming up short in the Big Ten Championship once again.
