COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina quarterback Spencer Rattler is on the watch list for the Davey O'Brien National Quarterback Award. This comes one day after he was named to the watch list for the Maxwell Award which goes to college football's national player of the year.
Rattler transferred to South Carolina from Oklahoma where in 2021, he was a semi-finalist for the O'Brien award and the CBS Sports national freshman of the year after he completed 214 of 317 pass attempts for 3,031 yards and 28 touchdowns with seven interceptions. He also rushed 81 times for 160 yards and six touchdowns in his redshirt freshman season in Norman. The Gamecocks are hoping he can return to that elite level this fall in his first season in the Carolina system.
The Davey O’Brien National Quarterback Award is the nation’s oldest and most prestigious national quarterback award and it honors candidates who exemplify Davey O’Brien’s enduring character while exhibiting teamwork, sportsmanship and leadership in both academics and athletics.
The 46th Annual Davey O’Brien Awards Dinner honoring the winner will be held Monday, Feb. 20, 2023, at The Fort Worth Club in Fort Worth, Texas.
The official Davey O’Brien Midseason Watch List will be released on Tuesday, Oct. 18, and will contain all active quarterbacks from the Preseason Watch List, all players honored as a weekly Great 8 recipient through the season’s first seven weeks and any additional quarterbacks approved by the selection subcommittee.
The Midseason Watch List will then be pared down to the 35-player Davey O’Brien QB Class of 2022 on Tuesday, Oct. 25. Fan voting on social media (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter) will again play a role in the semifinalist, finalist and winner voting totals when combined with the national selection committee’s ballots. Voting will begin on Oct. 25.
Sixteen semifinalists selected from the QB Class will be named on Tuesday, Nov. 8. The Foundation will announce the three finalists two weeks later (Monday, Nov. 21). The 2022 Davey O’Brien Award winner will be unveiled live on ESPN on Thursday, Dec. 8, during The Home Depot College Football Awards.
O'Brien won the 1938 Heisman Trophy before playing in the NFL for two seasons. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1955. He passed away in 1977 which prompted the creation of the Davey O'Brien Memorial Trophy. That award was originally geared towards honoring athletes from the Southwest but it branched out to where it is now a national quarterback award.
