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Washington backup QB K.J. Carta-Samuels will transfer for his final year of eligibility. The news was first broken by Steve Wiltfong at 247Sports. K.J. is set to graduate at the end of winter quarter and so would be immediately eligible as a grad transfer and available for spring ball for his new program. There’s no early indication where he might go but the fact that his QB coach and OC in Jonathan Smith just accepted the head coaching job at Oregon State, where there isn’t a clear-cut #1 QB, certainly hints at one possibility.
Thank you Washington and Coach Pete for my incredible time spent in this great community. I will always be a Husky. At this time I have received my release and look forward to next year and the opportunities ahead! https://t.co/YBNpNab0tu pic.twitter.com/4wrR1GWh7o
— KJ Carta-Samuels (@KJCS14) December 5, 2017
This move shouldn’t be a surprise considering the Huskies were currently slated to bring in two quarterbacks as part of the new recruiting class but lose zero. Next year’s QB room will now include: senior Jake Browning, redshirt sophomore Daniel Bridge-Gadd, redshirt freshman Jake Haener, and true freshmen Colson Yankoff and Jacob Sirmon. There was already a 0.0001% chance of Jake jumping to the NFL but if there were any chance of this happening you would think K.J. might stay and try to win the job over a true freshman again.
The 6’2” K.J. Carta-Samuels was the #11 pro pocket passer by 247sports and the #14 by ESPN recruiting services entering college out of Bellarmine College Prep in San Jose, California. He was the second highest rated recruit in Chris Petersen’s first class behind Budda Baker and the thought was he would be able to come in and be the guy.
However, he redshirted his freshman year in 2014, then served as Jake Browning’s backup for the past three seasons. He started one game against Stanford in 2015, in which he went 9-21 for 118 yards and a rushing touchdown in a 31-14 road loss. He’ll finish his Washington career having gone 27 of 51 for 310 yards with 3 TDs and 1 INT.
Washington fans should be appreciative of K.J.’s time in the program. He surely thought coming in that he would get to start sooner rather than later but never complained after losing his job to Jake Browning and served as a quality backup. He’ll leave the UW with a degree and hopefully will have the chance to find a starting QB job somewhere with his new school. Best of luck to you, K.J., and many thanks from Husky Nation!
Note: sorry if your comments on the original FanShot got lost. We didn’t want to post a longer article until it became official. You can find the original with those comments here. Thanks.