Bernie Kosar, Steve Walsh, Craig Erickson, Gino Torretta and Ken Dorsey all won national championships at the University of Miami. Torretta and Vinny Testaverde were awarded the Heisman Trophy.
But none of those quarterbacks ever had a day like Stephen Morris did last week against North Carolina State.
Morris threw for 566 yards in the Hurricanes’ 44-37 win, setting an ACC single-game record and blowing away the previous school mark of 485 yards by Torretta in 1991. Morris also surpassed Torretta’s record for total offense and tied the UM standard for touchdown passes in a game with five, a record Morris would also own if not for two drops in the end zone by his teammates.
Torretta, now a radio analyst for national college football broadcasts, kept track of the UM-N.C. State game last Saturday while inside a press box in College Station, Texas. It was at the end of the first quarter of the Miami game that Torretta knew his record for passing yards — set against San Diego State in the Orange Bowl on November 30, 1991 — was in deep trouble.
Morris finished the opening quarter with 271 yards, a total surpassed in one quarter by only three FBS quarterbacks since 2004, according to ESPN.
“I thought to myself, ‘Wow, he has a chance to throw for a lot,’ ” Torretta said. “It’s impressive. It was a great performance and even better that it came in a victory. He’s been playing outstanding in the last couple of weeks.”
This side of West Virginia’s Geno Smith, nobody has had a better two weeks than Morris. In thrilling wins against Georgia Tech and North Carolina State, Morris has thrown for 1,002 yards and seven touchdowns. He’s led the Hurricanes (4-1) to a 3-0 start in the ACC for the first time since joining the conference in 2004 and another victory Saturday night in Chicago against No. 9 Notre Dame will likely vault Miami into the Top 25 and Morris, with a big game, into the Heisman race.
Morris has also put the quarterback back in Quarterback U. Since Ken Dorsey left UM in 2002, the position has provided mostly disappointment. After serving two years as a backup to Jacory Harris, Morris is on a pace to throw for 3,924 yards. The UM record is held by Kosar with 3,642 yards in 1984.
Walsh, football coach at Cardinal Newman, said that Morris reminds him of Testaverde.
“He might even have better mobility than Vinny but he definitely has the arm strength that Vinny had and the physical presence,” Walsh said.
Morris showed all of those attributes on his game-winning 62-yard bomb to Phillip Dorsett with 19 seconds remaining against N.C. State. The 6-foot-2, 214-pound junior avoided a Wolfpack pass rusher, scrambled to his right then slung a pass that traveled more than 60 yards in the air.
Torretta said he’s been most impressed by Morris’ “ball disbursement” and poise.
“No matter how much they’re down by, they keep fighting and keep trying to come back,” Torretta said. ”The attitude from the quarterback resonates with the rest of the offense. It’s been fun to watch.”
Morris has directed two victories this season in which the Hurricanes trailed by 14 points or more. Those were the kind of deficits that caused recent UM teams to fold and wilt.
Senior cornerback Brandon McGee said the difference is Morris.
“Not knocking Jacory [Harris],” McGee said of UM’s starting quarterback from 2009-11. “Jacory was a great leader. Stephen is a great leader. But there’s something about how the team reacts to [Morris]. How the team just clicks with him.”
The Hurricanes have generated 1,260 yards of total offense the past two weeks, a number unmatched among the other 119 FBS teams.
The reason?
Coach Al Golden this week credited “the play of the quarterback.”
Morris hasn’t been perfect. The quick start last week was followed by a second- and third-quarter lull that allowed N.C. State to get back in the game.
“I’m still trying to get better,” Morris said.
But for one game, no UM quarterback has ever been better than Morris was last week.
“When you set a record, you hope it lasts forever,” Torretta said. “But if that’s what they need to win games and Stephen needs to have big games to be successful, so be it.”
