Notre Dame QB DeShone Kizer’s 2017 NFL Draft Stock ‘Soaring’

“As of now, I’m expecting to be the only guy”, Kizer said after talking with Kelly on Wednesday. The 6-5, 230-pound junior knows he won’t be looking over his shoulder after sharing duties with Malik Zaire in the opener. It’s not where we wanted it to be obviously, and you could see that it took advantage of us at times. “All I know is that he (Kelly) told me to prepare to be the starter on Saturday, and that’s what I’m going to do”. Less than halfway through the game, it was clear to the masses (judging by the social media chatter), but not Kelly, that Kizer was clearly the best player to be guiding the Notre Dame offense.

Notre Dame’s biggest question this season isn’t at the quarterback position, as their defense will have to make some significant adjustments after giving up 50 points to the Longhorns Sunday. Kizer is a right-handed quarterback while Malik Zaire is a lefty.

The decision comes on the heels of a Notre Dame loss on the road to the Texas Longhorns, who ironically used a successful two-quarterback scheme to knock off the Fighting Irish. But a broken ankle to Zaire in Week 2 moved Kizer up the depth chart, and he would go on to toss 21 touchdowns and 2,884 passing yards while maintaining a 63 percent completion percentage.

Kizer threw for five touchdowns and ran for another and guided Notre Dame within field-goal range two other times on 13 possessions. Notre Dame was one of three teams to have allowed multiple plays of 60 or more yards in Week 1, joining USC and, oddly enough, Houston. That is the thanks that Kizer got for trying valiantly to save Notre Dame’s season over the final 23 minutes of action. The most noticable to me were the actions and words of DeShone Kizer and Malik Zaire. Nevada comes to week 2 with overtime experience in week one as well, and the Wolf Pack even pulled off a win against Cal-Poly 30-27. It was just flashes of excellence, and it reminded me a lot of Steve McNair.

Notre Dame entered this season with some high expectations, and the stumble in week one will have the faithful out in droves for the home opener. “What really happened in the Texas game was you had the offense that had a chance to win the game – you’re going to have to play some games where you outscore people”.