Three Georgia State football players vie for the quarterback spot

After having its best season in school history last year, the Georgia State football team must turn over a new leaf, and find its next leader to hopefully take the team to new heights. Former quarterback Nick Arbuckle lead the Panthers to a 6-7 record and a berth in the AutoNation Cure Bowl. Now with Arbuckle gone, it is time for a new quarterback to step up and accept the challenge.

The race for quarterback has been ongoing since the spring with very capable candidates. Three candidates vying for the job are redshirt sophomore Emiere Scaife, graduate transfer Conner Manning and redshirt freshman Aaron Winchester.

Will Winchester?

Winchester is a native of Lawrenceville, Georgia where he attended Mount Pisgah Christian School, and earned All-State honors twice. In those two years, he passed for 4,227 yards while connecting for 56 touchdowns. He also led his team to the playoffs twice during his career at Mount Pisgah. Winchester had to redshirt his freshman year and he admitted that it was difficult given the success that he had in High School.

“Redshirting was a humbling experience for me, but it helped me to grow both mentally and physically,” Winchester said.

Growing mentally and his football IQ has been greatly attributed to his predecessor.

“I learned a lot from [Nick] Arbuckle. I learned how to watch and break down film and coverage’s, also learning how to play college football,” Winchester said.

Although he didn’t play, Winchester was around to witness the success that the team had, and now that Arbuckle is gone he is trying to become more of a leader.

“I feel that leaders naturally show themselves, and I think that I’ve done a good job of showing my leadership skills,” Winchester said.

Winchester was very impressive during the spring game as he threw for three touchdowns, and ran for another. Two of the three touchdowns passes were to wide receiver Mattavius Scott. Winchester never seemed flustered, and he always seem to make the right plays. He was sharp with his throws connecting on several long passes including one to wide receiver Todd Boyd for a 43-yard touchdown.

“I think I did well, I think that I was in a great rhythm especially from the previous scrimmages, and the game was really slow for me today,” Winchester said about his performance after the game.

Can Conner?

Manning played his high school ball at El Toro in Lake Forest, California. While at El Toro, Manning threw for 9,449 yards and 88 touchdowns. Manning also completed 62 percent of his passes while throwing for an average of 255.4 yards per game. Manning committed to Utah where he redshirted during the 2013 season, and played sparingly during the 2014 season in a game against the University of Arizona.

In the game, Manning completed two passes for twenty-eight yards. Manning packed his bags spring 2016 and headed to Georgia State to join the Panthers on their quest for a Sun Belt championship.

“That was one of my big things right away; I had to earn the respect of the guys. I feel like to be a leader, you have to have guys respect, so I came in respected everyone, and tried to gain their respect,” Manning said.

Manning had a solid performance during the spring game going 11-for- 21 for 82 yards.

“Just stepping up more vocally as a leader since I’ve been here I feel like I’ve improved a little bit, but I’m still not yet, we’ve got some young guys right now so we have to so a lot more teaching. I just want to keep helping guys as much as I can, and keep improving as a leader,” Manning said.

Emiere emerges?

Scaife is a native of Charlotte, North Carolina where he played for Mallard Creek High School. He had his senior season cut short due to injury, but he was able to pass for over 2,500 yards and total 26 touchdowns. Scaife redshirted his freshman year, and played in games against Oregon, Appalachian State, and Texas State last season.

Scaife also had a solid performance during the spring  game going 5-for-10 for 72 yards.

“My timing, being comfortable, and looking comfortable are the biggest things that I wanted to improve on this off season, especially after what Arbuckle was able to accomplish last year, I want to take over that role,” Scaife said.

A lot has happened since the spring time, and one of the notable things to happen was Arbuckle pledging his support for Winchester, the True Freshman over Twitter.

“If my family depended on my job & my job depended on a QB then I would depend on (@AwUno1). I trust that man with everything(@GeorgiaStateFB),” Arbuckle said via Twitter.

Winchester is the least experienced of the three candidates, since he has never taken a snap in a college game before. However, the other two Quarterbacks don’t have a lot of experience either. Both Manning and Scaife have played sparingly in games over their careers. None of the three quarterbacks have started a game before, which could cause some problems early on during the season. Winchester and Scaife have both expressed their goals for this team, and how they are gunning for the Sun Belt championship.

“This year we have very high expectations for ourselves, and we want nothing else, but to win a Sun Belt championship, we wake up thinking Sun Belt championship, and we go to sleep thinking Sun Belt championship,” Winchester said.

It would be nice to expect the Panthers to keep rising, and perform even better than they did last year, but they have to be careful getting caught up in the hype. Whoever wins the job cannot get caught up in trying to be the next Arbuckle because he is the reigning Sun Belt Student-Athlete of the Year and that will be hard to do. They just have to go out and perform to the best of their abilities.

The race for the job is still open, but no matter who wins the job, Panther football should be in good hands.