Let's look at what Colt McCoy has done in his first (almost) three years as the starting quarterback at the University of Texas. We'll skip all the "intangible" talk, and go right to the numbers, beginning with his freshman year.
1) Freshman Passing TD's, season: Colt had 29, setting a national mark; next-best UT freshman (the Major) had 18. After that you drop to Shea Morenz (13), then James Brown (12), then Mark Murdock (10). Vince was next, with 6.
2) Freshman Single game passing TD's: Colt had 6 once, 4 once, 3 twice. 6 is the record (JB had 5 & 4; Major 4, 3, & 3; Shea 3; Mark 3).
3) Freshman Passing yards, season: Colt had 2,570; next-best was Major (2,453).
4) Freshman Total offense, season: Colt had 2,740; next-best was Major (2,390).
Now let's open the door to include his sophomore year, and the first 11 games of his junior year:
1) Single-season passing yards: Colt has 3,445 in 2008, breaking Major's record of 3,357 set in 1999.
2) Career passing yards: Colt is at 9,318 yards, which puts him in 1st-place all-time at Texas, 965 yards ahead of Major's mark of 8,353. That would have put him 52th all-time back in 2005. All I can tell you in 2008 is that now 52 people have 10,000 plus. If Colt picks up another 3200 in his career, he should be in the top 10 all time (joining Graham Harrell (#2 today) & Chase Daniels (#11 today).
3) Single-season passing TD's: This season, with 32 TD passes, Colt broke his own mark of 29 set in 2006. Chris Simms and Vince Young's best mark was 26. Colt's 22 in 2007 tied him with Chris for 4th-all-time (5th now).
4) Career passing TD's: Colt is at 83 today, 23 ahead of the record Major set with 60. Chris had 58, JB had 53, Vince 44, Peter Gardere 37, Shea and Bobby Layne 25 each, Bret Stafford 23, and Todd Dodge had 18. Chance Mock finished with 17. James Street had 10, with 24 INT's, but went 20-0--the game has changed (or, looking at the Titans under Kerry Collins this year, perhaps it hasn't). Colt's is 33rd all-time of NCAA D-1 FBS QB's, 13 TD's from the top 8.
5) Single-season total offense: Colt has 4,021 yards in 2007, second-best behind Vince's 4,086 in 2005. Colt needs 65 yards in the bowl game to pass Vince. Colt’s total is in the top 50 single-seasons in NCAA history.
6) Career total offense: Colt has 10,556 to date, putting him 1,389 ahead of the former Texas career mark Vince set of 9,167. Peyton Manning was 28th on the all-time NCAA TO list going into 2008, and Peyton was at 11,201. Presumably Colt is now in the top 50. The 2005 NCAA record book shows Colt would have been 36th, but at that point Peyton was 19th. Only 34 guys have 11,000 plus. Colt’s 3,200 yards from the top 5 all-time, 4,200 from top 3.
7) Career TD's responsible for: Colt is at 99, putting him 18 ahead of Vince's mark set at 81.
8 ) Career completion %: Colt is at 70.2%--putting him well ahead of the greatest marks at UT (VY 61.8%, Chris 58.7%, Richard Walton 57.9%, Major 57.4%). Among the players with 10,000+ passing yards in NCAA history, only five completed more than 66% of their passes, and only one completed more than 70.2% (Colt Brennan, with 70.4%).
9) Career wins: Colt is at 31, one ahead of VY (30). My informal research showed that's about top 30 all-time, and one more puts him in the top 25. 35 wins is top 10; 38 is top 3; 39 top 2. The all-time record is David Greene's 42.
10) Career win %: Colt is at 81.6% (31-7), just ahead of Chris Simms (81.3%), a bit behind Bobby (82.4%), but well behind Robert Brewer (86.7%), VY (93.8%), and James Street (100%). It won't be possible for Colt to catch the top 3 this year, but an undefeated finish to his career this season and next would put him in third, barely edging out Brewer.
11) Single-Season Passing Efficiency: Colt is at 179.2 so far in 2008, top 7 in NCAA history.
12) Career Passing Efficiency: Colt's mark is 159.05, well ahead of VY at 141.8 in the second spot, followed by Chance (138.9), Chris (138.4), and Major (136.6). 159.05 puts him in the top 10 all-time in NCAA D-1 history.
13) Career completions: Colt's 784 are 173 ahead of Major's 611.
14) Career attempts: Colt's 1,117 are 52 more than Major's 1065.
15) Colt joined Major as the only UT QB's with 3 straight 2000+ yard seasons.
16) Colt has 28 200+ passing yard games, second only to Major (29). 11 of those games were this season, which ties Major’s season mark.
17) Colt has 9 300+ passing yard games, tied for the UT record with Major. Colt threw for 300+ 5 times this season, which ties the season mark, also held by Major.
18) Colt now owns the consecutive completions mark for a game (18, set against Oklahoma State). He had previously set the mark at 17 in one game after setting the mark of 13 in one game, and had tied the mark of 15 over two games. Of the 14 streaks of 9 or more consecutive completions in UT history, 10 are Colt's. Vince had 2 (15 & 14), Chris had 1 (11), and Major had 1 (9).
19) Colt's completion % this year is 77.6%, the highest of any UT QB with 12+ attempts in a season. James Brown set the old mark of 69.6%. Colt's consistency this season is incredible-his WORST % game had been 70.0% until Tech, when he fell all the way to 58.8%. 77.6% would shatter the NCAA mark.
20) Colt has 16 consecutive games with a passing TD, the 2nd-longest streak in UT history (Major had 19).
21) Going into the bowl game, the Texas offense has 114 drives under Colt, scoring 68 times (59 TD's, 9 FG's). That's 3.9 points per drive, 52% TD's, and 60% of the time ending in a score. By comparison, Vince's best finish was about 50% TD's, 60% scores, and 3.7 points per drive; Chris Simms' best season was 33.6% TD's and 2.7 ppd in 2001; and Major's best was 32% in 2001 and 2.5 ppd in 1998.
22) Colt owns the single-season completion record, with 291 this year.
23) Colt set the record with 38 completions in one game vs Oklahoma State in 2008.
24) Colt owns the single-game passing TD record (6) and completion % (90.63%).
25) Colt is one of 11 players from the FBS named to the 2008 Allstate AFCA Good Works Team.
One final note: against top 25 teams, Colt is now 7-3. The only losses were 24-7 vs #1 Ohio State on 9/9/06, 28-21 vs #10 OU on 10/6/07, and 39-33 vs #6 Tech on 11/1/08. Ohio State finished #2 in 2006, OU #8 in 2007.
I lied—here’s another note.
What would Colt’s numbers look like if Mack was pushing for stats?
11/27 vs A&M, Colt left with 12:22 left in the game. 11/15 at KU, Colt left with about 7:30 left in the game. 11/8 vs Baylor, Colt left with 12:58 left in the game. 11/1 at TT, Colt left with 1:29 left in the game (but certainly would have returned if we’d had the ball). 10/25 vs OK St, Colt left with 0:33 left in the game (but again, would have returned) 10/18 vs Missouri, Colt left with about 11:00 left in the game. 10/11 vs OU in Dallas, Colt threw his final pass with 4:00 to go in the game. 10/4 at Colorado, Colt left with 10:35 left in the game. 9/27 vs Arkansas, Colt left 5:23 to go in the 3rd quarter, 20:23 to go in the game. 9/20 vs Rice, Colt left with 0:03 to go in the 3rd quarter, 15:03 to go in the game. 9/6 vs UTEP, Colt left with 13:33 to go in the game. 8/30 vs FAU, Colt left with 13:09 to go in the game.
In total, Colt left about 122 game minutes early. Think his stats would look better if he kept throwing over those final minutes, when the other side has essentially conceded the game?