Bowling Green lost its quarterback of the future earlier this month when Jarret Doege entered the transfer portal and made the move to West Virginia, but it didn’t take long for head coach and former Boston College offensive coordinator Scot Loeffler to find his own.
On Wednesday morning, Jordan Strack—Sports Director at WTOL 11 in Toledo, Ohio—reported that the Eagles’ backup quarterback Matt McDonald had officially transferred to Bowling Green and was already on campus.
Whether or not McDonald, a redshirt sophomore, will be eligible immediately is unknown at the moment. If he has to sit a year, he will have just two years of eligibility remaining. Nevertheless, McDonald automatically catapults into the conversation for the starting quarterback job. After all, the Falcons’ only other two signal callers on the roster are Bryce Veasley and Grant Loy: a three-star quarterback who redshirted his freshman year and a redshirt junior who has made just one start in his career and completed 16-of-28 passes for 361 yards and recorded two touchdowns in three interceptions in 17 total appearances.
Whenever McDonald takes the field, he’s going to have big shoes to fill. Doege is coming off a season in which he logged 2,660 passing yards, 27 touchdowns, and just 12 interceptions. Not only that, but he completed 62.2 percent of his passes and averaged 6.8 yards per attempt.
Of course, part of the reason why his passing numbers were so high was because the Falcons’ run game was non-existent. In fact, Bowling Green finished the 2019 campaign with the 12th-worst rushing offense in college football—its ball carriers averaged 3.35 yards per rush attempt and scored just nine times all year. Couple that with a defense that allowed 40 points per game, and you have a high-volume passing offense.
That said, Doege was an undeniable talent on a 3-9 team. McDonald is part of a rebuild manufactured by his old offensive coordinator and now head coach.
While at BC, McDonald redshirted his freshman year before playing in two games this past fall. The Newport Beach, Calif., native made his collegiate debut against Massachusetts back on Sept. 1. He completed both of his pass attempts for 11 yards in a 55-21 blowout victory. One week later, the athletic quarterback starred in relief against Holy Cross. With a 34-point lead at halftime, head coach Steve Addazio turned to his backups in the final portion of play. When the fourth quarter rolled around, it was McDonald’s turn to shine.
The redshirt freshman kicked off the final frame with a 35-yard touchdown pass to tight end Hunter Long. Two drives later, McDonald snapped the ball out of the shotgun, looked left, and threw right, finding a wide-open Noah Jordan-Williams down the sideline. The redshirt freshman wideout hauled in the pass, broke a tackle, and cruised to the end zone for a 65-yard touchdown. When all was said and done, McDonald walked off the field having completed 5-of-6 pass attempts for 107 yards and a pair of scores.
McDonald’s appearances followed a strong spring—one that culminated in a 129-yard, three-touchdown Jay McGillis Memorial Spring Game—and an impressive training camp, where the second-year quarterback flashed his accuracy, as well as his running ability, to give E.J. Perry a run for his money at the QB2 position.
In all likelihood, Bowling Green is still a few seasons away from ending its three-year bowl drought, but McDonald, who’s sat for the majority of the past two seasons, could be on the brink of making his first-ever collegiate start.
Featured Image by Kristin Saleski / For The Heights
