Harris stands on healthy knees in Roadrunners’ deep QB race
UTSA quarterback Frank Harris noticed a difference in his stride as he jogged onto the field for UTSA'S first spring practice Monday, feeling mobility in his knee was at last returning to normal.
Injuries have nagged Harris through his career, with ACL tears costing him the 2017 and 2018 seasons and a knee sprain limiting him for stretches of 2020. The lingering effects became a running joke for the Roadrunners, with coach Jeff Traylor chiding Harris for walking like an old man.
Harris anticipates those quips being a lot fewer this year, seeing and sensing an improvement in his knee after undergoing a procedure to clean out scar tissue following the end of the 2020 season.
“My knees can go straight, actually. So it was a good process, and something I wanted to be done,” Harris said. “I was walking too bad, and it was hurting too much. I'm already 22, feeling real old. I don't want to be older feeling ridiculous and can't walk, so it was a great process for me.”
Harris said the recovery from surgery was smooth, limiting him in the weight room for about a month but not preventing him from working out entirely.
Despite the injury, Harris played in 11 of UTSA'S 12 games as a junior last year, making 10 starts. He finished the season with 1,630 passing yards, 12 touchdowns and six interceptions while rushing for 528 yards and nine scores, and he said increased health could make him more dangerous in 2021.
“I'll get my agility back, being able to cut and run,” Harris said. “All last year, my knee was bothering me, and kind of played an impact in some games, but I just fought through it. But now, it's great. I think it's going to be good for me this year, knowing that's not lingering around anymore.”
The shuffling quarterback situation was one of the main storylines of UTSA'S 2020 season, with
four players taking the reins of the offense at points during the year.
The Roadrunners enter spring with eight quarterbacks splitting reps across four groups of skill players, and Traylor said 2020 proved “you can't have enough” options behind center.
Senior Lowell Narcisse, who looked primed to assert himself as the Roadrunners' starter after completing 17 of 20 passes for 221 yards and a pair of touchdowns against BYU last season, is a limited participant in workouts as he recovers from a season-ending ankle injury suffered Oct. 17 against Army.
Narcisse said he sustained a fracture and a dislocation as well as damage to the surrounding cartilage, comparing his injury to what Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott endured. Narcisse was visibly favoring his left ankle as he moved through Monday's practice, and he said his greatest challenge in recent weeks has been maintaining his fitness level with his athletic capacity limited.
“The recovery process has been real slow,” Narcisse said. “When you have some deep tissue injury, it's nothing you can do to speed the timing up. All you can do is let time take place. So that's been the most frustrating part with me.”
Narcisse said Traylor is taking a “real cautious” approach to the quarterback's return to the field, and Traylor said he wanted to be “very, very careful” and “bring him along slow.”
“Obviously, he's frustrated. He wants to be faster and quicker, but I'm in the long run with Lowell Narcisse,” Traylor said. “He's an unbelievable young man, a great human being, and I don't care how long it takes for his ankle to get well. I'm going to ride it out with him.”
Senior Josh Adkins also earned a starting nod at quarterback last season when UTSA faced UAB on Oct. 3, but his opportunity was limited to just one snap as he suffered a broken collarbone on the game's opening play.
Adkins said he was back throwing a football within three and a half weeks of the injury, and he returned to full health in time to appear in three of UTSA'S final four games.
As Adkins and all of UTSA'S quarterbacks enter their first spring practice under Traylor, one of the focuses is adding more motions and formations to disguise plays. The Roadrunners also expect to carry a larger volume of offense into games this fall after 2020 preseason practices were limited because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
UTSA'S quarterbacks understand they're already fighting for a spot on a crowded depth chart.
“There's a lot of guys in there, and it's just iron sharpening iron,” Adkins said. “Obviously, the reps, sometimes you don't get as many as you would like, but that's not really what we're there for. We're there to compete, and work as hard as we can, and make the most of the reps that we do get. That's kind of the attitude for all of us.”