ALTOONA, Pa. -- Drew Allar might be awesome this year. Or he might be wildly inconsistent because of his inexperience. All of which makes it very difficult to predict just how good Penn State will be this season.
You know who else is in the same boat?
Most of the preseason top 10 teams in the country.
A bunch of them have to replace their starting quarterback -- in several cases going from a superstar to an unknown -- which leaves all of those teams in the same predicament as the Nittany Lions.
I don't recall entering a college football campaign with as much turnover at the quarterback position among so many of the preseason favorites. Since we're only talking about the most important position in all of sports, that leads me to one simple prediction.
This year is probably going to be nuts.
We've joked for years about how old Sean Clifford was and how long he'd been around at Penn State. But we at least always knew what we were going to get from Clifford, and then he surprised everyone by really turning it on late last season.
Can anybody honestly say they know what to expect from Allar? Yeah, everybody is hoping he lives up to his enormous hype, but no one should be surprised if he has a somewhat uneven season in a lot of ways.
And there's every reason to believe a lot of other top teams will be having the same issue with their quarterback. So, don't be surprised if we see wildly inconsistent play from even the best teams, and perhaps a good bit of chaos within the sport, which can be fun.
Let's take a look around the country, using Phil Steele's preseason top 10 as our guide.
1. GEORGIA
Stetson Bennett led the Bulldogs to back-to-back national titles. Yes, he had lots of help around him with stars at most positions, but Bennett was very, very good himself. He threw for 4,128 yards with 27 TDs and seven interceptions last season.
The QB this year will be Carson Beck, who threw for all of 310 yards last season, although he did have four TDs. Beck was the No. 5 pro style QB recruit in the country in 2020, and this is his fourth year in the program.
He's older and has some experience, but until he's called on to be the guy in a close game, you never know how he will perform. Then again, Georgia doesn't play a lot of close games because of its overall star power.
2. CLEMSON
D.J. Uigalelei was the Tigers' starter in 2022 but transferred to Oregon State. He threw for 2,521 yards with 22 TDs and seven interceptions last season.
Cade Klubnik, the backup last year, was the No. 1 QB recruit in the country in 2022. He will take over as the starter after throwing for 697 yards with two TDs and three interceptions a year ago.
Klubnik has tremendous upside, just like Allar, but is still inexperienced. Can he do what it takes for a No. 2 team in the country to live up to its billing? We'll see.
3. MICHIGAN
The Wolverines are a legit national title contender because they have both an outstanding running game and a returning quarterback in J.J. McCarthy. The former 5-star recruit threw for 2,719 yards with 22 TDs and five interceptions last year.
Sure, it's easy to poke fun at Michigan for losing to TCU in the national semifinal last year. I still cannot believe that happened, and it did in large part because somehow Jim Harbaugh got too pass happy in the game.
Regardless, I really like McCarthy and believe he can do a lot of damage in that offense, since teams have to gear up so heavily to stop the run game.
4. ALABAMA
Bryce Young, the 2021 Heisman winner, is gone after throwing for 3,328 yards with 32 TDs and five interceptions.
Who will succeed him? There's a competition between Jalen Milroe, Ty Simpson and Notre Dame transfer Tyler Buchner. Milroe, the No. 14 QB recruit in 2021, was the backup last year and threw for 297 yards with five TDs and three interceptions. Simpson threw for just 35 yards and was the No. 4 QB recruit in the nation in 2021. Buchner threw for 651 yards with three TDs and five interceptions for Notre Dame and was the No. 11 QB recruit in 2021.
Whoever Nick Saban picks, he may not have another Young or Tua Tagovailoa type of talent to work with. Sure, Alabama has won a lot of games over the years with relatively mediocre quarterbacks, but there's no doubt the position is a question mark for the Tide this year.
5. OHIO STATE
C.J. Stroud is gone after a sensational career. He passed for 3,688 yards with 41 TDs and six interceptions last year and finished third in Heisman voting.
Kyle McCord should get the first crack at taking over the job. He was the No. 8 QB recruit in 2021 and threw for 190 yards with one TD last year.
Devin Brown, who redshirted last year, also will be competing for the job. He was the No. 6 QB recruit in 2022.
Yes, Ohio State just seems to transition from one star quarterback to the next every few years. It's been that way for the better part of two decades. The Buckeyes have phenomenal wide receivers, which will help the transition to the new QB, but McCord and Brown still have to prove themselves.
6. PENN STATE
Sean Clifford is gone after passing for 2,822 yards with 24 TDs and seven interceptions.
Allar threw for 344 yards with four TDs and no picks in mop-up duty last year.
Allar is probably the most hyped quarterback in Penn State history, and if he lives up to the hype, the Lions could compete for a national title the next two years.
If he doesn't, then 8-4 probably comes into play.
Big difference.
7. USC
Heisman winner Caleb Williams returns after throwing for 4,537 with 42 TDs and five interceptions.
The Trojans have the most reliable returning quarterback in the nation, but there are questions about the rest of the team, which is why they're No. 7 and behind a whole bunch of teams with new QBs.
8. FLORIDA STATE
A lot of people really like the Seminoles this year, and they are one of the few teams that have an outstanding QB returning.
Jordan Travis threw for 3,214 yards with 24 TDs and five interceptions last season. If he improves on that and Florida State stays healthy, this is definitely a team to watch.
9. LSU
Jayden Daniels returns as the starter. He threw for 2,913 yards with 17 TDs and three interceptions last season.
He was the No. 1 dual-threat QB recruit in the country back in 2019 and played his first three seasons at Arizona State. He has tremendous potential, and if he can finally live up to it, then LSU could be a major factor.
10. NOTRE DAME
The Fighting Irish have a new QB, and he has an excellent track record.
Sam Hartman transferred in after playing five years at Wake Forest. In 2021, he threw for 4,228 yards with 39 TDs and 14 interceptions. Last season, he thew for 3,701 yards with 38 TDs and 12 picks.
Hartman figures to be a significant upgrade over Drew Pyne, who passed for 2,021 yards with 22 TDs and six interceptions a year ago.
GIGER'S TAKES
Some random thoughts about happenings in college athletics:
• Northwestern has a bunch of smart people, but they all look like fools for the whole hazing scandal. Pat Fitzgerald looks like a fool for allowing it to happen, and regardless of how much or little he actually knew, the fact of the matter is that he SHOULD have known it was going on under his watch.
Fitzgerald absolutely deserved to be fired. But goodness, the way the school handled things -- giving him a joke of a suspension for only two weeks before cutting him loose -- was pathetic.
Northwestern caved to public pressure, plain and simple. It should have just done the right thing in the first place.
There supposedly was a six-month investigation into the hazing allegations. But that investigation didn't lead to the grotesque hazing details that emerged, and instead it was a story by the student newspaper that documented the details. Good for those student journalists, by the way.
Regardless, Northwestern totally dropped the ball here. Shame on them.
And shame on Fitzgerald. Yeah, he seemed like a good guy, but this is yet another example of somebody who is well respected allowing something terrible to happen on his watch.
• Northwestern is keeping its assistant coaches, and they will run the program this year.
WHAT???
Surely those assistant coaches -- the ones who have been there for a while at least -- also would have caught wind of the hazing stuff going on right under their noses. And if they didn't know about it, then they're not very bright, either, because they weren't paying close enough attention.
• As much as I believe Fitzgerald should have been fired, it woudn't surprise me at all if he ends up winning a lawsuit or getting a gigantic settlement from Northwestern. He still had $42 million left on his contract, and given how badly the school blew it with his two-week suspension and claims that maybe he didn't really know all the details, you can bet Fitzgerald's lawyers will find a way to score big here.
Along those lines, this is one of the best tweets I've seen in a while:
Billable hours about to win the Big Ten West. https://t.co/4ot3GZHaTI
— Sean Fitz (@SeanFitzOn3) July 11, 2023
• Speaking of disgraced coaches, can Bob Huggins just go away?
Bigoted comments on a radio show, followed by a DUI, and yet the guy still wants his job. West Virginia stood by him after the first stupid mistake, but not the second. Now he's threatening to sue because he wants his job back.
Again, like with Northwestern, there's sure to be a big legal battle over a lot of money here.
