Tag: Jayden de Laura

Arizona quarterback Jayden de Laura enters the transfer portal

Another quarterback has put his name in the transfer portal.

The Arizona Wildcats will take on the Oklahoma Sooners on Dec. 28 in San Antonio, Texas, in the Valero Alamo Bowl. Ahead of the matchup, current Arizona quarterback Jayden de Laura announced that he would enter the transfer portal.

Since Sept. 23 against Stanford, de Laura has thrown just three passes while Noah Fifita took over the starting job due to injury. He never relinquished the job, leading the Wildcats to a 6-2 record in his stead. Now the former starter is looking to make a change, while staying with the Wildcats through the bowl game.

Jayden de Laura started his career with the Washington State Cougars for two seasons before joining Arizona prior to last season. In four seasons, de Laura has amassed 8,484 yards with 63 touchdowns to 31 interceptions

de Laura posted this message on X (formerly Twitter):

Jayden de Laura is another experienced gunslinger that can help elevate a team that is a quarterback away from competing for the College Football Playoffs.

Transfer portal quarterback market continues to change, with USC surveying its options

More plot twists emerge in the portal.

The transfer portal quarterback market is constantly changing. Remember when Oregon seemed to have Cam Ward on its radar screen, with the Ducks ready to bring him to Eugene?

Our friends at Ducks Wire wrote about the distinct possibility that Dan Lanning might bring Ward to Oregon:

“This portal entry is significant for Oregon Duck fans because there is a chance Dan Lanning and Will Stein be in the market for a new QB this offseason. With Bo Nix leaving for the NFL, the 2024 QB1 spot is open. Ty Thompson, Austin Novosad, Michael Van Buren and Luke Moga are expected to compete for it. At the moment, Thompson has the best chance of that group to get the starting job, but it would not be a surprise to see the Ducks get a veteran QB out of the portal to compete for that starting spot.

“Don’t be shocked if Ward ends up being that guy.”

That quickly changed when Dillon Gabriel entered the portal. Oregon pivoted to Gabriel and then locked up Dante Moore for 2025 behind Gabriel for 2024.

The market changes quickly. USC has been courting Kansas State transfer Will Howard, with Cam Ward reportedly in play for Miami and Florida State. Now that Jayden de Laura is in the portal, will any of these schools — or others we haven’t even mentioned yet — change their intended top QB targets in the portal? We shall see.

Visit our friends at Fighting Irish Wire, Buffaloes Wire, and Ducks Wire.

Arizona quarterback, former Washington State Cougar Jayden de Laura enters transfer portal

Very intriguing.

Jayden de Laura has played for two Pac-12 programs. He won’t play for a third because the Pac-12 has died, but could he play for a third school which belonged to the previously existing edition of the Pac-12? We shall see.

De Laura declared his intent to enter the transfer portal on Monday. Previously at Washington State, de Laura transferred to Arizona. He began the season as the starting quarterback for coach Jedd Fisch but got hurt. Freshman Noah Fifita filled in and became a star who displaced de Laura from the starting role. De Laura got Wally Pipp’d, to use a particular phrase longtime sports fans know well.

Fifita is the toast of the town in Tucson after leading Arizona to a surprising 9-3 season. De Laura knew he would not be the starter in 2024, so he is seeking a fresh start elsewhere.

It is hard to think USC and Lincoln Riley would want de Laura, but maybe de Laura’s new presence on the open transfer market will make another school change its choice, which could in turn reshape USC’s available menu of options. We shall see.

Visit our friends at Fighting Irish Wire, Buffaloes Wire, and Ducks Wire.

Intrigue surrounds QB Jayden de Laura for Arizona at USC

We will soon learn if Jayden de Laura is healthy enough to start for Arizona against USC.

If Jayden de Laura is healthy enough, the Arizona quarterback will start in the Wildcats’ upcoming battle at No. 9 USC.

De Laura, who suffered an ankle injury in the Wildcats’ road win over Stanford, could potentially start over Noah Fifita, who made his first career start against seventh-ranked Washington on Saturday.

In Arizona’s 31-24 loss to the Huskies, Fifita, a redshirt freshman, was impressive. He almost led the Wildcats to an upset.

De Laura had made the previous 16 starts for the Wildcats since transferring from Washington State, but was ruled out after injuring his ankle on the final play of the third quarter at Stanford earlier in September. This season he has thrown for 1,069 yards and 10 touchdowns with five interceptions, adding 131 rushing yards and three scores.

The third-string and emergency quarterbacks for Arizona are Brayden Dorman and walk-on Cole Tannenbaum.

USC-Arizona is a 7:30 p.m. Pacific time kickoff from the Los Angeles Coliseum on Saturday night. The Trojans will try to move to 6-0 on the season before the slate becomes a lot tougher with a trip to Notre Dame on October 14.

Follow Buffaloes Wire for complete coverage of Deion Sanders and Colorado.

Follow Ducks Wire for coverage of Oregon football leading into the big game against Washington on October 14.

USC win over Colorado feels hollow because Alex Grinch isn’t doing his job.

Experts think Alex Grinch will prevent USC from making the Pac-12 Championship Game.

The coach who ripped Jordan Addison for transferring to USC is now staring at a humiliating season in Pittsburgh.

Pac-12 Preview: Arizona Wildcats look to find footing in third year under Jedd Fisch

Can Arizona crawl out of the Pac-12’s middle class in 2023? We break it all down in our complete season preview.

As June starts to roll into July, and July eventually leads us to the start of fall camps at the beginning of August, the 2023 college football season will be here before we know it. What a season it projects to be in the Pac-12 Conference, as well. With a handful of College Football Playoff contenders, and a group of Heisman Trophy candidates leading their prospective teams, we could be set up for one of the best football seasons out west that we’ve seen in decades. To help get us prepared, we at Ducks Wire wanted to go through each team in the conference and give a comprehensive breakdown of each school, breaking down their 2023 outlook. Welcome to our Pac-12 Previews. New editions will be published every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday leading up to the start of fall camp. 

It’s not a great year to be a middling Pac-12 team that likely needs to reach bowl eligibility in order to avoid a coaching change in 2023.

Unfortunately for Jedd Fisch and the Arizona Wildcats, that seems to be the situation going into this new season. Things have not gone swimmingly over the past decade in Tucson, and while there have been a few signs of life — offensively, at least — in the past year, that needs to start resulting in wins, and postseason appearances for a school that reached the Pac-12 Championship Game less than a decade ago.

The talent is there, offensively. Jayden de Laura is an extremely capable quarterback with elite weapons in WR Jacob Cowing and WR Tetairoa McMillan at his disposal. RB Michael Wiley is a proven veteran out west, and TE Tanner McLachlan made our list of potential breakout players in 2023.

Defensively is where the improvement needs to be made. Although they lost a couple of their top secondary players in Christian Roland-Wallace and Christan Young, the Wildcats utilized the transfer portal to add guys like LB Justin Flowe and DE Taylor Upshaw to the roster. Will that be enough to get the job done?

We’ll see, but it is certainly an uphill battle for the Wildcats. Here is our full 2023 season preview for Arizona.

Social media reacts to Oregon’s dominant 49-22 blowout over Arizona Wildcats

The Ducks exercised some demons in the desert on Saturday with a blowout over Arizona. Oregon fans rejoiced online.

The Oregon Ducks have some demons that tend to come out to play whenever they travel down to the desert and face the Arizona Wildcats.

Those demons were nowhere to be found on Saturday night in Tucson.

Oregon was dominant against the Wildcats from start to finish, ultimately winning by a score of 49-22. The rushing attack for the Ducks was spectacular, racking up a total of 306 yards and 7 touchdowns on the ground, and the defense was everything you could have asked for against a dangerous Arizona passing attack. The Wildcats finished the game with only 241 yards through the air, turning the ball over 3 times.

After all of the hardships that Oregon has experienced against Arizona over the years, fans certainly enjoyed a stress-free blowout against the Wildcats. Here are some of the best reactions to the game on Twitter.

3 keys to victory for No. 12 Oregon Ducks against Arizona Wildcats

The Oregon Ducks are looking to make it 5 wins in a row, with a road battle against Arizona next up. Here are three keys to victory.

Dan Lanning and the Oregon Ducks head to Arizona to take on a Wildcats team that turned over the majority of their roster after going 1-23 the past two seasons.

They already have three wins on the young season, and while they haven’t played anyone close to Oregon’s caliber they are a team to keep an eye on as Jedd Fisch works to pull them out of the conference cellar.

However, the Ducks should be able to take care of business and pick up another road victory, although Arizona has disrupted Oregon’s best laid plans in the past.

Former WSU quarterback Jayden de Laura leads a strong passing attack, but there is plenty Oregon can do to avoid suffering a catastrophic loss in the desert, including:

Pound the ball on the ground

(Photo by Tom Hauck/Getty Images)

Arizona has allowed over 200 rushing yards per game through four contests this season, while their passing defense is top-30 in the country. So for Dan Lanning and the Oregon Ducks the game plan should be fairly simple: hand the ball to their backs and let them do their thing.

Bucky Irving (7.5 YPC) Sean Dollars (6.4) and Noah Whittington (5.3) have all shown plenty of times they have the ability to bust things open in the running game, and running the ball will allow Oregon to control the pace and tempo of the game, while taxing Arizona’s defense and burning some clock.

All that should lead to points on the board, and eventually another Oregon victory.

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Know the Opponent: Arizona offense presents major challenge for Ducks

With QB Jayden de Laura and some of the most talented receivers in the Pac-12, Oregon’s defense is going to be put to the test against Arizona.

Perhaps it’s a good thing the Oregon Ducks football team got to play Washington State before heading down to the desert to play Arizona. The two offenses are similar and it gave the Duck secondary a good idea of what they’ll be facing in Tucson.

The Cougars and Wildcats are intertwined this season with Jayden de Laura being the Arizona quarterback. He transferred out of the Palouse after just one season. The scenery may have changed, but de Laura has not.

In the five games as a Wildcat, de Laura has completed 63 percent of his passes, averaging 327 yards through the air, and has 14 touchdowns. Unfortunately for Arizona, however, his ability to throw it to the other team hasn’t changed. De Laura has been picked off six times already.

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Despite those miscues, Oregon head coach Dan Lanning says de Laura is one of the most dangerous quarterbacks in the conference.

“I think this quarterback really can play well. He throws lasers. He throws the ball on rhythm on a dart and he doesn’t need a big window to be able to attack,” Lanning said. “He’s able to extend play with his feet. This is a really good challenge for us.”

The receiver de Laura likes to throw to the most is UTEP transfer Jacob Cowing. He led the Miners in receiving in his previous three seasons and Cowing has just continued that success at Arizona. He leads the Wildcats with 40 catches and averaging 113 yards per game. He has found the end one seven times as well.

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But the guy on the other side of the field, Dorian Singer, is no slouch himself. The 6-foot-1 sophomore has 32 catches and averaging 90 yards per contest and has one touchdown.

The Ducks also can’t forget about freshman Tetairoa McMillan, the prized recruit that got away. He decided to go to Arizona at the last minute and so far, he’s played well for the Cats with 16 catches, three of those going for touchdowns. McMillan is the reigning Pac-12 Freshman of the Week.

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“They have speed and then really outside they have size and they make contested catches,” Lanning said. “So if the quarterback can put it close they have a great chance of winning on 50/50 balls. For them, I don’t know if you’d call them 50/50 balls, it’s more like 70/30 because they come down with it a lot of time.”

Oregon is also going to get tested along the line as the Wildcats have some major beef up front that would make Stanford jealous. Their largest lineman is right tackle Jonah Savaiinaea, who comes in at 6-5 and 335 pounds as a true freshman. The “smallest” starting lineman is center Josh Baker at 6-3 and 310 pounds.

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SKOL Search: Anthony Richardson captivates the nation

Welcome back to our SKOL Search series! To kick off the season and 2023 NFL draft coverage, here are the top performances from week one

Welcome to SKOL Search 2023: a series dedicated to who the Minnesota Vikings could draft in the NFL draft.

Throughout the course of last season, we brought you scouting reports, mock drafts and different scenarios under this banner and will continue that this season with an expanded format.

This year, the banner of SKOL Search will cast a much wider net. Every week, there will be a roundup-style breakdown of major prospect performances, scouting reports throughout the season, mock draft roundups and much more.

After week one, the quarterbacks were the ones that stole the show.

Does Oregon now have to worry about a Cameron Ward-led Washington State team?

Washington State’s new QB Cameron Ward will be thrilling to watch. Will he be enough to threaten Oregon’s supremacy in the Pac-12 North?

When you look at the traditional powers in the Pac-12, and specifically in the Pac-12 North division, the Washington State Cougars are not often a team that comes to mind. Though they have had some solid seasons over the past decade — an 11-2 season and pair of 9-4 finishes under Mike Leach since 2015 — there aren’t many people who are routinely picking them to make it to the Pac-12 title game.

Is this the year that it changes, though?

I ask that question because of the shift at the quarterback position for the Cougars. While former Pac-12 Freshman of the Year Jayden de Laura was a nice piece up in Pulloose, Washington State has brought in a transfer at the position this year that has a chance to make waves in the Pac-12. His name is Cameron Ward, and he promises to be among the most exciting players to watch in 2022.

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Ward comes from Incarnate Word, an FCS school in San Antonio, Texas. They don’t have a long history of winning championships, but Ward certainly created a nice profile for himself in his two years with the team, throwing for just under 7,000 yards and 71 touchdowns. His 2021 season really put him on the map and made him a coveted transfer prospect after putting up 4,648 yards and 47 touchdowns with 10 interceptions.

After de Laura transferred to the Arizona Wildcats, the Cougars brought in Ward, and he now stands to “shock the college football world” according to Bleacher Report. 

Maybe the most exciting, intriguing player to watch for the 2022 season is Washington State transfer quarterback Cameron Ward.

The Texas native starred for two seasons at FCS Incarnate Word, where he showed a strong arm and massive talent. At 6’3″, 220 pounds, Ward is a big-time athlete who looks like he has the potential to become a great quarterback, even if he’s raw.

He followed Eric Morris to Pullman after the former Incarnate Word head coach left to become a Power Five offensive coordinator. Ward chose the Cougars over an odd group of schools including Ole Miss, Prairie View A&M and Houston.

As a freshman in 2020, Ward threw for 2,260 yards, 24 touchdowns and four interceptions, and he followed it up with a massive ’21 season in which he completed 61 percent of his passes for 4,648 yards, 47 touchdowns and 10 interceptions.

With Pac-12 Freshman of the Year Jayden de Laura off to Arizona, the Cougs are Ward’s team, and he and Morris will combine to lead the “Coug Raid” attack. Look for big numbers to follow.

You can look at Washington State’s range of finishes in the Pac-12 North over the past 5 years and understandably not be threatened, but remember that they managed to place second last season in 2021, and threatened to make it to the Pac-12 championship game had Oregon dropped their final game of the season. The truth of the matter is that the Cougars have their program going in the right direction, and should they be able to find a gem at the quarterback position, it could push them over the top into conference contention.

Will Cameron Ward be that gem? It’s certainly not out of the question and will be pretty entertaining to watch.

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