Junior Dane King To Start At Quarterback
8/27/2004 12:00:00 AM | Football
Aug. 27, 2004
Junior college transfer Dane King has been named Baylor's starting quarterback for the Bears' Sept. 4 season-opener at UAB, head coach Guy Morriss announced Friday following his squad's 90-minute workout in shells. King, a native of Gonzales, Texas, was tabbed as the Bears' starter over sophomore Shawn Bell, who started Baylor's final two games of the 2003 season, at No. 1 Oklahoma and against No. 24 Oklahoma State in Waco. King, who played the previous two seasons at Blinn (Texas) College, joined the Baylor program in January and has been battling Bell for the top spot on the depth chart since spring drills. "We've decided to start Dane (King) in the opening game," said Morriss. "I think both guys did a great job. It was really close, a tough call. The thing that coach (Brent) Pease felt like with Dane was we had a chance to push the ball up the field a little better with the deep ball. We have to at least threaten people deep, so we aren't trying to run against 11 in the box." A two-year starter at Blinn, King earned second-team National Junior College Athletic Association All-America and first-team All-Southwest Junior College Football Conference honors in 2003 after leading the NJCAA in both passing (301.8 ypg) and total offense (322.3 ypg). He holds every Blinn passing record and threw for 4,742 yards and 36 touchdowns over this two-year career at the Brenham, Texas, school. "From what I saw, Dane can get it up the field a little bit better and he has a little better feel and arm strength on the deep ball." he added. "I don't think you could wrong starting either one of them, really." The Bears will return to work on Saturday with an 80-minute workout in the morning, then go through a walk-through on Sunday afternoon before taking Monday off and settling into their normal game-week routine on Tuesday. "We shortened it (practice) up pretty good and tried to slow things down just a little bit and do some teaching," said Morriss. "We want the kids to get freshened up and get their legs back under them. We started that process today, we'll lighten up even more tomorrow and then Sunday will go through a walk-through and give them Monday off. I think they'll be fresh and ready to go when we get back at it on Tuesday. Practice Notes: Thirteen players missed Friday's workout with injuries including Julian Hill (shoulder), M.T. Robinson (knee), Paul Howard (hamstring), Tyler Lindstrom (broken hand), Josh Bell (knee), Shaun Rochon (sore back), Glen Oskin (knee), Brandon Whitaker (knee), Will Blaylock (knee), Desmond Jenkins (shoulder), Michael Sambrooks (hamstring), Aaron Bobo (ankle) and Mike Miller (eye infection) ... On player who returned to practice Friday was Michael Gary, who had missed Thursday's practice with a neck injury.
