BOWLING GREEN — Scot Loeffler said Monday that Bowling Green did not have a final answer from the NCAA on transfer quarterback Matt McDonald, who applied for a waiver to be immediately eligible this season.
For the time being, that leaves Bowling Green with two eligible scholarship quarterbacks — and a challenging scenario for any offense.
The Falcons started graduate transfer Darius Wade in its 46-3 win against Morgan State, and Wade won the Mid-American Conference East Division offensive player of the week for hurling three touchdown passes in just three quarters of work.
Behind him is Grant Loy, whose effectiveness as a dual threat — Loy rushed for 60 yards on eight carries and threw a touchdown of his own last week — could serve as an offensive weapon for Bowling Green, even if Loy isn’t starting.
However, the circumstances under which Bowling Green is operating are hardly usual for a Division I program with the season already in progress.
Asked if the Falcons have to be careful with how they juggle quarterbacks, Loeffler smiled.
“If you have two — it’s really scary when you have one. So yes, absolutely,” Loeffler said. “Two is scary enough. Hopefully, we have three.”
McDonald joined Bowling Green this summer after transferring from Boston College, where Loeffler was the offensive coordinator from 2016 to 2018.
The redshirt sophomore cannot play this season without a waiver, and would have to sit out the 2019 season if the NCAA upholds its initial ruling through the appeals process.
Bowling Green hopes to have a resolution sooner rather than with a game looming Saturday at Kansas State. Either way, the ruling will change the landscape of the season for the Falcons, whose depth chart lists McDonald as a co-starter along with Wade.
Even in the event McDonald must sit out this season, Bowling Green saw an encouraging start from Wade, who played in his first live game in 20 months. The offense as a whole gained more than 600 total yards of offense.
Loeffler said Wade still was not as crisp as BG would like, and that the play of the quarterbacks will be amplified when the Falcons go on the road for the first time this week.
“There were some things in that game [where] he wasn’t as sharp as you’d wish,” Loeffler said. “He had some unnecessary movements in the pocket, he took the wrong footwork at times, [and] there was probably five or six missed opportunities that we need to make. When you’re going in and playing teams like Kansas State, you don’t get those plays back.”
Even with the mistakes — Wade most notably missed Jordan Wayne-Prather for a likely touchdown on a rollout in the first half — he still finished 22-for-32 for 253 yards and did not throw an interception.
Wade also became the first Falcon to win a weekly MAC award after no BG player earned one during the 2018 season.
Though last week’s game still offered room for improvement, Wade showed signs of being a possible answer at BG’s most precarious position.
“We need to make sure he improves fundamentally just like I said our whole team needs to,” Loeffler said of Wade. “But for a guy that hasn’t played in a year, I was happy with his performance.”
First Published September 3, 2019, 6:25 p.m.
