Swogger leaving WSU
PULLMAN – It’s said the most popular person in a football town is always the backup quarterback.
This week, that couldn’t be more true.
Josh Swogger, who started for Washington State as a sophomore captain then was relegated to the No. 2 role as a junior, secured his release from WSU during Thanksgiving break and is now looking at a list of at least seven Division I-AA schools for his senior season.
“It seems like there’s a new school that calls every hour,” Swogger said Monday afternoon, with three new schools having called earlier in the day. “There are a ton of options.”
For the time being – and not in order of preference – Swogger is considering Eastern Illinois, Eastern Washington, Idaho State, Montana, Montana State, Richmond and Youngstown State.
“Unless something happens in the next couple hours,” he joked. “It’s going to get crazier as the week gets older. I’m just kind of manning the phones.”
To wit: Montana State is visiting Swogger today. Montana and Idaho State will join that parade later in the week. And the strong-armed passer is heading to Montana State this weekend for a visit of his own.
At 6-foot-5 and 255 pounds, Swogger was named by at least one preseason magazine the strongest-armed passer in the Pac-10 last summer, before Alex Brink beat him out in fall camp for the job. Since he has already used a redshirt year, Swogger can’t transfer to a I-A school because he doesn’t have an extra year of eligibility to sit out per NCAA transfer rules.
However, the quarterback can go to a I-AA school and play right away.
“In the end, I’m going to go where I feel comfortable,” Swogger said, “where I feel I can compete, where I can showcase what I can do, where I’m comfortable with the coaches, the offensive coaches, and where I have a chance to go to the playoffs and win a national championship.”
A number of other factors will go into the decision, however. Swogger should be two classes from graduation after this semester, so schools that allow for a smooth academic transition could have an edge. Youngstown State holds obvious appeal because it is near Swogger’s Ohio hometown, but his wife will be staying in Pullman this spring finishing her degree, so a Big Sky school could be a better fit.
“There’s (an) upside to every school,” he said. “I’ll go home in the middle of December. … I’ll make my final decision then.”
Swogger played in just three games in 2005, throwing 18 passes and completing nine for 147 yards and a touchdown. In 2004 he was 91 of 193 for 1,283 yards, 13 touchdowns and seven interceptions. But that sophomore season was cut short by a litany of injuries, most notably a broken foot that needed season-ending surgery after the sixth game of the year.
Despite inconsistency, Swogger did show signs of breaking through in fourth-quarter comeback wins at New Mexico and Arizona, though the injuries did slow him by the time the Pac-10 season got underway.
Without Swogger, the Cougars are down to four returning scholarship quarterbacks next season. If the order remains unchanged, rising sophomore Gary Rogers – he of five career passes – will be Brink’s primary backup, followed by a redshirt freshman in Arkelon Hall.