Saturday’s opener looks like a tough match for the home team. Bowling Green’s quarterback passed for over 4,000 yards last year with only 4 interceptions. Pete Thamel disects Bowling Green’s “devastating” spread offense:
Now, the offenses Meyer and Brandon will run will be conceptually similar but vastly different. Brandon’s quarterback, Omar Jacobs, had a more productive year than Smith last season, passing for 4,002 yards while throwing 41 touchdown passes and only 4 interceptions.
Jacobs, a junior, landed at Bowling Green after a quarterback backed out on his commitment 10 days before signing day. Meyer called every quarterbacks coach he knew to see if there were any unsigned quarterbacks. He got a tip from a coach at Kansas State on a towering quarterback with an unorthodox throwing motion in South Florida – Jacobs.
Mullen was recruiting in Michigan and drove to Notre Dame, where Meyer used to be an assistant, to watch film of Jacobs. The next night, Meyer was in Jacobs’s living room making a pitch for Bowling Green. Jacobs bit, and four years later is considered a Heisman Trophy contender.