The football was in his hands again, and it felt fine.
It wasn't as though he were reaching for a foreign object. Paul Peterson knows his way around a football and knows how to fling it. He whipped one all over his home state of Utah, where he was a one-man blizzard who threw for 5,500 yards and 55 touchdowns in two seasons at Snow Junior College.
A Mormon who in 2001 completed a two-year mission in Nicaragua, the 24-year-old Peterson transferred to Boston College last season, making the cross-country trek with his wife, Meghan, and all their worldly belongings in a 1994 Nissan Sentra.
A backup to Quinton Porter last season, Peterson gave a glimpse of his potential when he replaced the injured starter and led the Eagles to three consecutive victories at the end of last year's 8-5 campaign. He won the starting job this season and became the first BC quarterback to win his first six starts. He was voted the Eagles' most valuable player after guiding BC to an 8-3 record and a four-way share of the Big East title.
So when Peterson, who fractured his right (throwing) hand late in the first half of a 34-17 win at Temple Nov. 20, picked up a football again, the grainy leather reawakened the nerves in his fingertips.
"It felt fine," said the 6-foot, 190-pound senior from Ephraim, Utah, who this season passed for 2,358 yards and 16 TDs. "It felt normal, besides the fact I have a golf ball-sized (bump) right there," he said, pointing to a spot near his right thumb, which he was icing after a recent practice.
Was the swelling normal? Or was it a result of Peterson trying to hurry back?
"Oh, it was normal," he said. "I mean, even when I was throwing during break — once I got permission to throw — it'd just swell up normally."
And so the Eagles and their quarterback will play the hand they've been dealt when they face future Atlantic Coast Conference opponent North Carolina at 1 p.m. Thursday in the Continental Tire Bowl at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, N.C.
"I'm excited to be back," said Peterson, 10-2 as a starter. "I mean, I'm just happy to be at practice again. It stunk watching them, you know? It just stunk watching that last game.
Peterson was referring to the season-ending 43-17 setback against Syracuse Nov. 27 at Alumni Stadium, which cost the Eagles the conference title outright and a Bowl Championship Series berth in the Fiesta Bowl.
After that game, Peterson emerged from BC's locker room, dejected and openly wondering how he might have affected the outcome. "Let me in there and let's see what happens," he said.
"I know it'd be a different game had he been in there," said coach Tom O'Brien. "He's 10-2 as a starter. I mean, he's our Flutie."
Now Peterson will get the chance to weave his magic again, as the Eagles go for their fifth straight bowl victory (in their sixth consecutive bowl appearance).
"I'm just glad I got one more shot to go out there," said Peterson, who in his two seasons at BC has completed 281 of 469 passes for 3,482 yards and 26 TDs.
But Peterson knows it was fortunate he did not pull a Kevin Brown at Temple. Upon learning that he had broken his hand, Peterson could have taken a cue from the Yankees pitcher and punched out a wall, doing more serious damage.
"I was really frustrated and I was showing some emotions I hadn't shown before, because I thought that was it," Peterson said. "I mean, I thought it had been taken away from me.
"I was pretty frustrated, kicking stuff, yelling. I was pretty mad — from the sidelines all the way to the locker room."
His disposition took a turn for the better when Diane English, BC's team physician and orthopedic surgeon, examined his X-rays and delivered some encouraging news: He had a fracture, but it would likely heal in three weeks after surgery.
That seemed to give Peterson plenty of time to get healed for a trip to the Fiesta Bowl. But the Eagles stumbled at the tape against Syracuse. The Orange became bowl-eligible with the win but wound up absorbing a 51-17 trouncing against Georgia Tech in the Champs Sports Bowl Dec. 21.
"They got their butts kicked, man, but, hey, Georgia Tech's a good team," Peterson said. "They've got some good athletes."
Did that soften the disappointment of the season-ending setback?
"Hey, Syracuse came out firing and they were ready for us," Peterson said. "We weren't. Maybe we made them look that much better than what they were.
"Maybe it's just me, but I'm a pessimist. I always look back at the things I could've done or should've done. I'm happy for the things the team was able to accomplish and that I was able to be a part of it.
"I just always say to myself, 'I wish I had four years to be here,' instead of just these two that went by real fast."
Peterson is hoping to make an impression on NFL scouts when he and BC teammates Grant Adams and T.J. Stancil play in the Gridiron Classic Jan. 15 in Orlando, Fla.
"What kid wouldn't want to play (in the pros)? That's every kid's dream," he said. "But, being realistic, I'm not the prototypical quarterback. But if they gave me a shot, it'd be awesome.
"For me, what do I expect from myself? I'm going to go out with a bang," he added with a smile. "I'm going to try my best because here I am with nothing left. This might be the last game I ever play."
If it is, he will be content with one last opportunity to have the football — and the hopes of his teammates — in his hands.
In other bowl matchups:
HOLIDAY BOWL: There have been countless seasons when the California Golden Bears would have been ecstatic to be invited to the Holiday Bowl. Any bowl, for that matter. Just not this year.
Fourth-ranked Cal expected to be playing up the freeway at the Rose Bowl, until the BCS pairings came out and the Golden Bears were shocked to hear that the Texas Longhorns had leapfrogged them and were going to Pasadena.
So the Golden Bears came to San Diego and uttered the obligatory bowl-week mantra of how happy they are to be here for tonight's matchup against No. 23 Texas Tech and its spread offense, which scored 70 points twice this season.
The Golden Bears (10-1) say they're over their bitterness. But what quarterback Aaron Rodgers said in early December still stands: That Texas coach Mack Brown — a two-time Holiday Bowl loser — "was classless" in begging for poll votes.
"But those thoughts are behind us," he said. "We're focused on Texas Tech and hopefully trying to end off the season on a high note."
EMERALD BOWL: Navy coach Paul Johnson downplayed the differences between his players in their dress blues and those sitting just a few feet away wearing oversized New Mexico sweat suits.
As much as Johnson tries to convince everyone the Midshipmen are just like all the other college football players in the country, the reality is that just a few months after Navy plays New Mexico in Thursday's Emerald Bowl, some of these young men will head off to war.
It's the path they chose, and Aaron Polanco and company seem to be cherishing their final football opportunities all the more.
The matchup with the Lobos will provide its own challenges for Navy, which less than two months ago dealt with the death of former player JP Blecksmith, who died during a military operation in Fallujah, Iraq.
While New Mexico's players emphasized they respect everything about the Naval Academy, they also believe they owe it to themselves to treat this like any other game. The Lobos are on a roll, having won five straight to end the season at 7-4. They are happy to be playing in a new place in the postseason after going to the Las Vegas Bowl the past two years and losing both times to Pac-10 schools.
They haven't won a bowl game in 43 years, when they beat Western Michigan in the Aviation Bowl in Dayton, Ohio, in 1961. They are 0-3 since then.
SILICON VALLEY CLASSIC Northern Illinois and Troy will meet in a rain-soaked, mostly empty stadium thousands of miles from home in a game stretching well past most of their players' bedtimes.
And since that's what it takes to end their schools' bowl droughts, coaches Joe Novak and Larry Blakeney are thrilled to be at the Silicon Valley Football Classic.
"There's honestly no place else we'd rather play right now," Novak said. "It's a thrill to be in San Jose."
It's probably the season's most unlikely bowl matchup: Novak's Northern Illinois club (8-3), which hasn't been to the postseason in 21 years despite going 10-2 last season, will face Blakeney's up-and-coming Trojans (7-4), who are making their first Division I-A bowl appearance Thursday night.
"Both teams are coming in with a lot to prove to the world," Troy tailback DeWhitt Betterson said. "They probably feel as if they're an underdog university, and we feel the same way."
It's the first time in the Silicon Valley Classic's five-year history, Fresno State and its thousands of faithful, red-clad fans won't be at Spartan Stadium. The starting time is 8 p.m. PST and rain in the forecast.