Big 12 Expects Huge Season from Top QBs, Oklahoma State Faces Most of Them

FRISCO, Texas — Quarterbacks are back in the Big 12, baby!

Okay, so maybe Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark didn’t say it exactly like that during the conference’s media days earlier this month, but he was close enough.

“This year, our star power, especially a quarterback, will be on full display,” Yormark said. “The Big 12 returns nine starting quarterbacks who threw for over 2,400 yards last season. The rest of the Power 4 combined, just 11.”

To understand what 2,400 yards looks like, former Cowboy Alan Bowman threw for 2,423 yards last season despite losing significant playing time to other quarterbacks throughout the season. 

And yeah, Yormark’s literal job is to make the Big 12 look good, but he’s not wrong about the quarterback thing.

This week, The Athletic sorted all 136 starting college quarterbacks into seven tiers. The top three tiers included 30 total passers.

The Athletic’s top 30 QBs:

SEC- 8
Big 12- 8
ACC- 7
Big Ten- 5
Others- 2

Other than the SEC, which had five Tier 1 quarterbacks, the Big 12 either tied or beat every other conference in Tiers 1, 2 and 3.

For this exercise, The Athletic projected Hauss Hejny to win the starting gig in Stillwater based on his longstanding relationship with new offensive coordinator Doug Meacham. Hejny checked in at QB76 on the list in the Tier 5 category.

For context, The Athletic describes this tier quarterback as “Many have played well in college, but haven’t put it all together consistently yet and bring some ‘what-ifs’ into 2025.”

Considering Hejny hasn’t attempted a college pass yet, it’s hard to find too much fault. Tier 4 was “young unproven starters with high potential” so Hejny would also have a case for that list.

An unnamed Power 4 coordinator was quoted in the story describing the six-foot Hejny as “a little bit shorter, but the kid is a tough son of b****.”

It’s easy to imagine a world where Hejny, or Zane Flores, vastly exceeds this ranking this fall, but the tier list does show how big the challenge could be for Big 12 defenses this fall. 

Here’s the list of quarterbacks expected to make some noise in the Big 12 this season:

1. Sam Leavitt (Arizona State)

Athletic ranking: Tier 1, seventh overall

Status: Returning starter, 11-3 record last season

2024 stats: 2,885 passing yards, 24 touchdowns and six interceptions

61.7% completion rate, 8.2 yards per attempt

443 rushing yards, five touchdowns, four yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Not on the schedule.

2. Josh Hoover (TCU)

Athletic ranking: Tier 1, 9th overall

Status: Returning starter, 9-4 record last season

2024 stats: 3,949 passing yards, 27 touchdowns and 11 interceptions

66.5% completion rate, 8.4 yards per attempt

-19 rushing yards, four touchdowns, -0.4 yards per carry

Impact on OSU:  Not on the schedule.

3. Sawyer Robertson (Baylor)

Athletic ranking: Tier 2, 11th overall

Status: Returning starter, 6-4 record last season

2024 stats: 3,071 passing yards, 28 touchdowns and eight interceptions

62.2% completion rate, 8.3 yards per attempt

230 rushing yards, four touchdowns, 3.7 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Baylor visits Stillwater in Week 5. The Cowboys have eight days to prepare for Robertson after facing Tulsa. In 2024, Robertson completed 57.9% of passes for 222 yards, three touchdowns and one interception. That was one of his worst starts as a passer, but he rushed eight times for 73 yards and a touchdown against Oklahoma State, which was by far his second-best rushing performance of the season.

4. Rocco Becht (Iowa State)

Athletic ranking: Tier 2, 14th overall

Status: Returning starter, 11-3 record last season

2024 stats: 3,505 passing yards, 25 touchdowns and nine interceptions

59.4% completion rate, 7.7 yards per attempt

318 rushing yards, eight touchdowns, 3.2 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Oklahoma State ends the regular season at home against the Cyclones. Becht was extremely productive last season despite a lower completion percentage. He also doesn’t run as much as the stats suggest last season, 20 of his 98 attempts came against UCF when he rushed for two touchdowns and 97 yards. 

5. Brendan Sorsby (Cincinnati)

Athletic ranking: Tier 3, 20th overall

Status: Returning starter, 5-7 record last season

2024 stats: 2,813 passing yards, 18 touchdowns and seven interceptions

64% completion rate, 7.2 yards per attempt

447 rushing yards, four touchdowns, 4.3 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Oklahoma State hosts Cincinnati in Week 8 following back-to-back games against Arizona and Houston. Sorsby might be best considered something of an opportunistic runner. He finished with at least 12 rushing attempts in four games while finishing with seven attempts or fewer in five games. When Sorsby committed to the run more, he finished with 52, 48, 143 and 93 rushing yards, His best performances as a runner came in two of his final three games.

6. Avery Johnson

Athletic ranking: Tier 3, 22nd overall

Status: Returning starter, 9-4 record last season

2024 stats: 2,712 passing yards, 25 touchdowns and 10 interceptions

58.3% completion rate, 7.3 yards per attempt

605 rushing yards, seven touchdowns, 5.4 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: The Cowboys have an extra week to prepare for Kansas State, which visits in Week 12 following OSU’s final bye week. The timing couldn’t be much better, considering Johnson is the top returning dual-threat quarterback in the Big 12 after leading all returning conference quarterbacks in rush yards and yards per carry. Last season, he carried the ball five times against the Cowboys for 60 yards and two scores.

7. Devon Dampier (Utah)

Athletic ranking: Tier 3, 25th overall

Status: New Mexico transfer, 5-7 record starting last season

2024 stats: 2,768 passing yards, 12 touchdowns and 12 interceptions

57.9% completion rate, 7.1 yards per attempt

1,166 rushing yards, 19 touchdowns, 7.5 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Not on the schedule.

8. Behren Morton (Texas Tech)

Athletic ranking: Tier 3, 27th overall

Status: Returning starter, 8-4 record last season

2024 stats: 3,335 passing yards, 27 touchdowns and eight interceptions

63.3% completion rate, 7.2 yards per attempt

-22 rushing yards, 1 touchdown, -0.4 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Oklahoma State travels to Texas Tech in Week 9 for the Cowboys’ third road game of the season. Morton is a bit of a throwback to the days of pure pocket passers, but he makes up for it. He’s second on this list in completion percentage, third in passing yards and third in touchdown-to-interception ratio. No quarterback in the conference is ahead of him in all three categories. Morton completed 69.8% of his passes for a season-high 401 yards, four touchdowns and one interception against OSU last season.

9. Jalon Daniels (Kansas)

Athletic ranking: Tier 4, 34th overall

Status: Returning starter, 5-7 record last season

2024 stats: 2,454 passing yards, 14 touchdowns and 12 interceptions

57% completion rate, 8.2 yards per attempt

447 rushing yards, six touchdowns, 4.8 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Oklahoma State’s only consecutive road game takes place at Kansas following the trip to Texas Tech. Daniels and the Jayhawks were thought of as a dark horse for the conference crown last season. Instead, Kansas started out 1-5 before turning into one of the hottest teams in the nation during the last six weeks of the season, when Kansas fell two points shy of knocking off four consecutive ranked teams.

10. Noah Fifita (Arizona)

Athletic ranking: Tier 4, 36th overall

Status: Returning starter, 4-8 record last season

2024 stats: 2,958 passing yards, 18 touchdowns and 12 interceptions

60.5% completion rate, 6.9 yards per attempt

17 rushing yards, one touchdown, 0.3 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: Oklahoma State travels to Arizona during Week 6 for its second road game of the season. Fifita’s home-road splits last season largely line up or even at times favor his performance on the road. So, home sweet home might not boost Fifita’s performance much in this one. The biggest thing to watch out for might be a bounce-back season, considering Fifita’s completion percentage was 12 points higher in 2023. He also threw 25 touchdowns to only six interceptions that year while taking nine fewer sacks.

11. Conner Weigman (Houston)

Athletic ranking: Tier 4, 51st overall

Status: Texas A&M transfer, 3-1 record starting last season

2024 stats: 819 passing yards, three touchdowns and five interceptions

56.1% completion rate, 7.2 yards per attempt

101 rushing yards, 3.6 yards per carry

Impact on OSU: The Cowboys host Houston in Week 7. Weigman regressed last season as injuries sidelined him for at least one huge stretch, causing him to lose the starting job at Texas A&M. He started 13 games across three seasons with the Aggies, so he has yet to be the guy for any serious stretch. 

The last five spots belong to teams with ongoing, largely highly competitive quarterback competitions. OSU only faces one of these other four teams, UCF on the road on Nov. 22.

It doesn’t seem worth digging into the specific guys at this point, but here’s where they ranked on The Athletic’s list.

12. Colorado (Tier 4, 52nd overall)

13. West Virginia (Tier 4, 57th overall)

14. UCF (Tier 5, 68th overall)

15. OSU (Tier 5, 76th overall)

16. BYU (Tier 6, 99th overall)