Nebraska's Matt Rhule accuses SEC schools of tampering with QB Anthony Colandrea originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Nebraska Cornhuskers head coach Matt Rhule wants to keep his starting quarterback, Anthony Colandrea. The transfer quarterback from UNLV has been everything the Cornhuskers could have hoped for.
On Monday, Rhule disclosed that teams are already looking to sign Colandrea for the 2027 season, per On3. Rhule and the Cornhuskers have already seen this end with Dylan Raiola's departure last offseason.
Rhule wants to avoid the same fate with Colandrea, an amazing dual-threat quarterback. Colandrea has 1,570 passing yards and 14 touchdowns, completes 62.6% of his passes, and has 334 rushing yards and four more touchdowns.
“I don’t think that’s a good narrative for us to have out there that he doesn’t have enough support,” Rhule said. “I don’t think that’s good for our players. And not good because he’s already got SEC schools calling him. I don’t want Nebraska people to start saying that, because that’s happened before here. We don’t need that now here.”
When asked about how he deals with it, Rhule said tampering is "just kind of part of the deal." He also stated that Colandrea has good players around him and that they'll get better.
"Like I said, I think we’re two plays away from being in the big, big conversation. But we’re not out yet, so we’re going to just try to get better this week.”
Nebraska started the season how every team hopes, 5-0, before dropping their last two games by a combined six points. They had Oregon and Indiana on the ropes before letting those games slip late.
Colandrea played well and scored a rushing touchdown in both games. Against Indiana, he had 264 passing yards against a defense that held Heisman frontrunner Jeremiah Smith to 68 receiving yards, his fewest all season.
The Cornhuskers (5-2) head into a bye week and look to get back in the win column when they face Washington on Saturday, October 31.
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