Wednesday, February 16, 2011

The Big Sky just got a whole lot crazier

It's official, Nate Montana has transferred from Notre Dame to the University of Montana. It seems that Eastern Washington University and the rest of Big Sky have their own Cuban Missile Crisis in football. The NFL legend's son is surely to bring his dad's skill and coolness to Washington-Grizzly Stadium.

Hold on, this might be all a farce, read what ESPN had to say...

It's questionable whether the quarterback would have ever made the roster had his name been Nate Wyoming. But as the son of Joe Montana, he was going to be given a shot. And the Irish were glad to have him last season after he transferred back in from junior college, because Montana was the most experienced quarterback on the roster after Dayne Crist.

Montana played in three games in 2010, going 9-for-18 for 116 yards with an interception. When Crist got hurt against Michigan and Tommy Rees looked nervous and shaky, Montana was the one who had to finish the half.

But once Rees improved and wound up starting and finishing the final four games victoriously, Montana clearly became the odd man out. The Irish brought in highly regarded freshman Everett Golson in this recruiting class and have Andrew Hendrix and Luke Massa from last year's signing class, plus the return of Rees and Crist. Brian Kelly said that there was no way to get six quarterbacks reps in practice and that the group would be thinned. It didn't take a genius to see that Montana needed to find a new home.



Montana fans shouldn't celebrate just yet, because Nate is an unproven commodity. Nothing against the kid, and seriously it will be cool to have the QB have the same name as the state he represents (Should make for some cool photos). Here's what Mick Holien, the godfather for Montana football (and Polson resident), had to say on his blog...

It’s been quite the winter for such drop-down quarterback speculation and the school no doubt will receive quite a degree of national pub for his arrival.

A business school enrollee and a finance major at Notre Dame, Nate will be a junior in eligibility and have two years to play two seasons.

He is described in the Notre Dame Press Guide as “a raw but talented quarterback” who enjoyed his best career outing in the Blue-Gold Spring game where he connected on 18 of 30 passes for 223 yards and three touchdowns as the Gold quarterback.

Six-foot 4-inches and 215 pounds, his younger brother, Nick, is a quarterback at the University of Washington.

It’s a good thing he’s a Libra because he needs the strength and creativity of his astrological sign to grow out of the shadow of his famous father and blossom as something other than the son of a four-time Super Bowl and National Championship winning quarterback.

As my good buddy, Charley Mitchell, suggested, maybe the town of Ismay which changed its name to Joe Montana in his honor in 1993, should consider another moniker alteration.

So while Montana has the namesake, EWU had transfer Bo Levi Mitchell. Might I add that Mitchell has pantented "gunslinger" tattoos on his arms. ADVANTAGE: EWU.

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