Weber State football coach Dave Arslanian isn't about to get caught up in the office/water-cooler discussion of who the best quarterback in the state is after five weeks of college action.
"There are a lot of good quarterbacks in the state, there always are," he said. But soon after being diplomatic about the somewhat loaded question, Arslanian gave a hint about his preferred choice on the subject."I'm sure the other coaches would say the same thing, that `none of us would trade ours' for someone else's," he said, referring to his quarterback extroardinaire, Bryan Martin, who is coming off of back-to-back passing performances of more than 500 yards a game.
The 6-foot-3, 215-pound senior is on course to crash a pass-efficiency rating record at Weber State set ironically by a former Wildcat with the same last name (no relation) - Jamie Martin.
Through five games, including two against solid Div. I defenses, Martin has a pass-efficiency rating of 163.2, completing 121-of-192 passes for 1,883 yards with 14 touchdowns and six interceptions. Jamie Martin's best rating was 147.6 in 1991, his junior season.
Martin's been especially impressive against Division I-AA competition, completing 81 of 122 passes for 1,373 yards (457.66 a game) with 11 touchdowns and three interceptions.
This Saturday's game against fifth-ranked Montana (12:07 p.m. start on Prime Sports) will be a good evaluator of where he stands against a tough passing defense. The Grizzlies are ranked 18th in Div. I-AA against the pass.
THOUSANDS MISSING OUT: Though the Wildcats just swept a three-game homestand and put up record offensive numbers in doing so, apparently that's not quite enough to convince the Weber State fans to come to the stadium.
Attendance dropped drastically during the three-week period. A respectable 10,507 showed up to see the St. Mary's game, but then just 9,128 came to the Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo showdown the following week. Last Saturday, only 8,131 fans witnessed the Wildcats third-straight win and conference opener.
Last year, during its do-or-die season, Weber State averaged 12,853 fans at Wildcat Stadium (capacity 17,500).