Brian White has never been especially happy with his role as backup quarterback, but now that might change.
For better or worse, Colorado’s 14-10 loss to Colorado State on Saturday officially marked the re-opening of the quarterback competition.
“I guess with what’s happened so far, it’s looking like that,” White said. “I guess right now it’s week to week.”
That’s good news for him, because he may see the field this season as starter. But for coaches searching for stability at the most important position on the offense, it’s a hair-pulling experience.
“We’re not in a situation where we’re entrenched anywhere, and we’ll just kind of play it out,” offensive coordinator Mark Helfrich said. “Is the ideal situation to have an experienced guy? Sure. But we’re playing our hand and we’re trying to play it as well as we can and the guys are competing.”
Junior Bernard Jackson was the surprise starter to Colorado State, fans and media, and initially his presence paid dividends. He led the Buffs downfield on their first drive – nine plays, 65 yards for a touchdown to give CU a 7-0 lead.
But not much happened after that. CSU bottled up Jackson, James Cox was sprinkled in at times, and Colorado’s offense mostly just stalled. After 118 first-half yards, CU put up just 28 in the second half. CU coach Dan Hawkins said he and his staff are going to look at how the position is handled.
“It’s hard to wrestle with that,” Hawkins said. “We’ll have to sit down and evaluate where we are. You don’t want to play musical chairs with your quarterbacks.”
But right now it seems CU has to. Asked if the competition was wide- open again, Helfrich said: “You could probably put it that way. We’ve just got to find a way to score the ball. We haven’t found that way, obviously, and that’s on us.”
Helfrich said Saturday’s plan was to start Jackson and play Cox more but “through the course of the game, that kind of changed.”
Jackson completed 8-of-13 passes for 70 yards and ran 18 times for 30 yards. Cox was on the field four times, but for only three plays, and completed 1-of-2 passes for 1 yard.
Now, the job is going to the player who performs well during practice. Helfrich said Jackson “really recommitted himself (last) week and practiced well. We thought he gave us a better chance to win.”
White said he knew Jackson was going to start.
“Probably with the amount of reps that he got (last) week I think we knew he was going to play a significant amount,” White said.
Now it could be anybody.
“Everybody is going to have to step their game up,” White said.
Other offensive players don’t seem to mind.
“I don’t have a preference,” wide receiver Patrick Williams said. “They have a job to get the ball to us, and we have a job to catch it. If Coach Helfrich thinks that Bernard should be the man this week or James should be the man next week, we have the offense that it shouldn’t matter. We’re all one team.”
Said running back Byron Ellis: “We’re just trying to find that quarterback on offense so that we can be efficient enough to get up and down the field. We’ve got three good quarterbacks. Now, we need to find one that can help this offense and help us get better.”
Chris Dempsey can be reached at 303-954-1279 or cdempsey@denverpost.com.
