EAST LANSING, Mich. — Thursday was Day 1 of fall camp in East Lansing for the Michigan State football team, and it was also the first day of the new quarterback competition.
"It's a very good competition," MSU head coach Mel Tucker said. "A lot of good balls being thrown. Really good communication. Guys on the same page with the formations, the checks. It was good work out of that group."
Following former MSU quarterback Payton Thorne's departure to Auburn, the Spartans quarterback room has a whopping three games and six snaps of experience combined.
No more No. 10. Well, there is a new man wearing Thorne's old number.
That would be redshirt junior Noah Kim, who looks to be in lockstep in a two-man race for the job with redshirt freshman Katin Houser.
"You have to have the leadership of if I am the starter, I have to have the right mindset in camp, practice, stuff like that," Kim said. "There's many ways to approach this competition. I am just focusing on me and what I need to do with the team. That's going to take care of itself."
However, Tucker has said true freshman Sam Leavitt also wants a crack to be QB1.
All of the quarterbacks have each other's back and feel like they are both getting a good feel for the offense.
"It's interesting," Houser said. "I am not looking too much into it, honestly. I am focused on the team right now. In the quarterback room, we talked about how we are not thinking about competition, competing with one another. We're competing with our defense right now in fall camp. So that's my focus for this month."
Tucker says with 24 days of fall camp remaining, he is in no rush to name the starter ahead of the Central Michigan game on September 1.
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