LAKELAND — With just minutes remaining in his senior season, Jeff Driskel took a snap from his own 9-yard line and dropped back to pass. As Lakeland High defenders bore down on him, the four-star quarterback rolled out to his left to avoid pressure. Running out of time and room, he shed one defender in the backfield and jetted down the left sideline before juking a defensive back in the Dreadnaughts’ secondary. Ninety-one yards later, Driskel accounted for his fifth touchdown of the night, and what would be his last for Oviedo Hagerty High.
In his team’s first playoff appearance in school history, against one of the state’s premiere teams and in front of a crowd of more than 5,000 on the road, Driskel, the No. 1 quarterback recruit in the nation, racked up 507 total yards of offense to go with his five-touchdown performance.
The right-handed passer went 15 of 27 for 176 yards and two scores through the air while also running the ball 20 times for 273 yards and two touchdowns. He added a 58-yard touchdown reception on a trick play in his team’s 56-35 Class 5A playoff loss.
It was a memorable final performance for Driskel, a UF oral commit whose 6-foot-3, 225-pound frame and ability to run and throw have drawn comparisons to a former UF quarterback — Tim Tebow.
But Driskel is used to the hype and attention.
“The (Tebow) comparisons have been coming and I’ve embraced them” he said. “It’s a great compliment to be compared to the greatest college football player ever.”
Handling the Hype
According to his father, Jerry Driskel, there wasn’t always a spotlight on his son as a quarterback. In fact, the attention didn’t start until shortly after Jeff’s sophomore year of high school.
Driskel was always more of a baseball player. Jerry grew up playing baseball, so he taught Jeff to play when he was 5 years old.
His aspirations were originally in baseball, which he excelled at, and he is considered one of the top baseball prospects in the nation.
It wasn’t until just before high school that Driskel got into football. He played in a Pop Warner league and really enjoyed it.
Following his sophomore year, he started going to various summer camps and combines, including ones sponsored by Under Armour and Nike, as well as two Army All-American combines in San Antonio.
“Local guys knew him when he was a freshman,” Jerry said. “But nationally, right after his sophomore year he started going to some combines … and that got him on the radar pretty good.”
That’s when the hype began, and there was no end in sight for the quarterback prospect.
Even though his team finished 2-8 his junior year, the dual-threat quarterback (whom Rivals.com ranks as the nation’s top pro-style passer) threw for nearly 1,500 yards and 11 touchdowns while adding five touchdowns on the ground.
The promise he showed at camps combined with his performance on the field only added to the attention he received from college coaches, recruiters and the media.
“Once it starts, it’s a little overwhelming,” Jerry said.
When the scholarship offers began to roll in, Jerry said his son would get at least three phone calls a day from media outlets that wanted to talk to the highly touted passer. And while it was a lot to deal with, Driskel didn’t want to decline interview requests from anybody.
Along with the interviews, people would come up to him after games and ask for his autograph. Following the Lakeland game, a young fan accompanied by his father approached Driskel with a Gators football and asked the star to sign it.
Driskel, of course, fulfilled the fan’s request.
“He knows it comes with the territory when you’re a big-time quarterback and you’re going to college,” Jerry said.
Driskel’s coach, Nate Gierke, helped him deal with the pressures of being the top-rated passer in the nation.
Gierke, who has been around high school football his entire career and was an assistant at Orlando Edgewater High before taking the head coaching position at Hagerty, has dealt with some sought-after recruits during his time in the business, including current UF linebacker Lorenzo Edwards.
The Hagerty coach passed along ways he’d seen prospects deal with hype in the past, and he said the quarterback exceeded his expectations.
“The whole season I’ve worked hard and stayed humble,” Driskel said. “I think that’s the biggest key, staying humble.”
The Second Coming?
Tebow, who was a part of two BCS national title teams and became the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy, cast a long shadow over Florida’s program, a shadow that John Brantley, Jordan Reed and Trey Burton have not been able to overcome.
With Driskel planning to enroll at UF in January, and his performance against Lakeland being the final image of his high school career, the expectations surrounding the quarterback will only continue to grow when he steps on campus.
“I’m not worried about the hype,” Driskel said. “There’s been hype for a while now and I think I’ve handled it pretty well.”
Brantley, once thought to be the heir to Tebow’s throne, has struggled during his first season as Florida’s starter. He has been the focus of criticism from Gators fans, who have booed the quarterback at times this year.
And while Florida’s offense has been stagnant, Driskel has flourished for Hagerty, leading the Huskies to a 7-4 record and the first playoff appearance in the school’s brief history.
Driskel, whose arm is ranked as the strongest in the nation by Rivals, has proven his ability to torch defenses while being able to buy time with his feet and often making something out of nothing.
Of his 273 rushing yards against Lakeland, most came on plays that weren’t designed runs, including his 91-yard touchdown and a 65-yard scramble in which he shed another defender in the backfield before showing off a burst of speed down the sideline that some would deem unnatural for a player of his build.
“The great ones are just born with that,” Gierke said. “He’s got that innate talent to make things happen, and he’s done that for four years for me.”
Meanwhile, Brantley and Florida’s offense have struggled to step out from Tebow’s shadow, ranking 73rd in the nation in total offense just one year after finishing sixth in the same category.
Brantley also arrived at UF surrounded by high hopes after being rated the nation’s No. 3 pro-style quarterback in 2007, but Driskel’s running ability makes him a more natural fit for the scheme Tebow made so successful.
“I didn’t coach Tim Tebow in high school, so I don’t know,” Gierke said of the comparisons to Tebow. “All I know is, again, I’ve been around high school football my entire life. [Driskel is] the best high school football player I’ve ever seen. Period.”
Whether Driskel gets the opportunity to shine as a freshman remains to be seen. He expects to come to Gainesville in the spring and compete for the starting quarterback job, but said he will do whatever the coaches ask of him.
Some fans have already started to call for the soon-to-be freshman to start next season in hopes that he lives up to the hype and might just be the next Tim Tebow.
“For any true freshman at any position, much less quarterback, to be expected to go in there and be the savior, or something like that, that’s a little bit too much to ask,” Gierke said. “But, if there’s anyone that can do that, it’s Jeff, because he’s got the mental makeup, more importantly than anything else, to do all that.”
