Jared CohenThe tradition continues at Chandler High School.
Brett Hundley, Darrell Garretson and Bryce Perkins have all gone on the the division I level to play quarterback and next up, its soon-to-be senior Mason Moran.
The 6-3, 180 pound quarterback has been good enough to start at most other schools around the state the last two seasons but has said he is a Chandler Wolves guy through and through. Now it is his turn to take the wheel in 2015 and he is excited to show what he can do.
“I am so stoked,” said Moran. “I’ve been looking forward to it plus with all the weapons we have coming back from N’Keal (Harry) to Chase (Lucas) to Kolby (Taylor) to Taj (de Carriere) to Micah (Reed-Campos) to Anthony Clay. It’s ridiculous. I am so stoked and the opportunity is going to be so amazing.”
For Moran, replacing a player like Bryce Perkins comes with a lot of expectations. Mix that with the anticipation of him becoming the starter and there could be quite the amount of pressure involved. But Moran now in that role is keeping it loose this time of year for spring practice.
“We’ve just been coming out here and having fun,” Moran explained. “Not trying to get too serious because if you do, you start over thinking everything. So we have just been having fun, doing our thing out here, cracking jokes but then again taking of the work we need to get done out here,”
Though Moran has been the back-up Quarterback, he has still been on the field in every game for the last two season’s as one of the state’s top safeties. So much so that he has been getting recruited with the athlete tag leaving the door open to play quarterback or safety at the next level. Last week however, Oregon State came through and gave him his second Pac-12 offer, the first coming from Colorado, and it was different than all the others to this point. It was to be a quarterback.
“Recently it has been all athlete offers up until when I talked to Oregon State,” mentioned Moran. “Oregon State was a strictly QB offer which was my first just strictly QB.”
“I actually talked with Coach (Dave) Baldwin (Beavers new Offensive Coordinator) last night and he puts guys into the league,” he added. “He put Garett Grayson into the league, he put (Brian) Hoyer into the league with the Browns. So I looked him up on the internet and he’s got a really good reputation and his resume is really impressive. So I like that a lot and getting an offer from them was amazing.”
In addition to Oregon State and Colorado, Moran holds offers from Air Force, Boston College, Louisville, Northwestern, UMass and UNLV to this point. It is often these days in recruiting that quarterbacks, if that is the position he intends to play, commit early. Moran realizes that but still has a ways to go in the process.
“I’ve been talking with my parents a lot and will be talking with my coaches because like you said, Quarterbacks commit early and everything,” stated Moran. “It’s been a lot of talking, a lot of prayer. I could’t give you an exact time of when I would be committing, but I would say sooner than later.”
