Jared Curtis Receives National Honor Following Blaze Berlowitz Being Named Vanderbilt Football Starter
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NASHVILLE---In the hours following Vanderbilt naming veteran quarterback Blaze Berlowitz its starter, five-star freshman quarterback Jared Curtis received another national piece of recognition.
The Maxwell Football Club announced Wednesday that Curtis has been placed on the 2026 Shaun Alexander Freshman of the Year Award watch list, presented to the outstanding freshman player in college football. Curtis is one of 37 players on the preseason watch list.
Curtis is Vanderbilt football's most highly-decorated recruit in program history and was ranked the top quarterback in the 2026 high school class by every major recruiting service. Behind a recruitment highlighted by Nate Bargatze shouting Curtis out on College Gameday, Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia and Vanderbilt baseball coach Tim Corbin going to his high school games in person and a full-on Curtis watch at Vanderbilt's home game against Missouri, Vanderbilt flipped Curtis from Georgia.
Even after Berlowitz was highlighted as the program's starting quarterback in week one, Curtis remains in competition to become the program's long-term starting quarterback. Per ESPN's Pete Thamel, Curtis will play in Vanderbilt's opener against Austin Peay despite Berlowitz starting.
Curtis' camp has been up and down, but he's shown flashes of being the quarterback that Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea thinks he can be.
“I haven’t seen that kind of explosive release and the ball flight since playing with Jay Cutler,” Vanderbilt coach Clark Lea told Vandy on SI over the summer. “The way he manipulates arm angles reminds me a lot of what we see from Matthew Stafford.”
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Joey Dwyer is the lead writer on Vanderbilt Commodores On SI. He found his first love in college sports at nearby Lipscomb University and decided to make a career of telling its best stories. He got his start doing a Notre Dame basketball podcast from his basement as a 14-year-old during COVID and has since aimed to make that 14-year-old proud. Dwyer has covered Vanderbilt sports for three years and previously worked for 247 Sports and Rivals. He contributes to Seth Davis' Hoops HQ, Basket Under Review and Mainstreet Nashville.
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