West Virginia’s Will Grier adds another Manning Award weekly honor

Will Grier, a junior from West Virginia University, has been selected as the Manning Award Quarterback of the Week for the second time this season. He earns the win over seven other Manning Award Stars of the Week in the Allstate Sugar Bowl’s Facebook contest.

Grier completed 32-of-41 passes for 352 yards and five touchdowns, including four unanswered touchdowns in the final 20:07 of the game, as the Mountaineers erased a 35-17 deficit in a 46-35 Big 12 win over No. 24 Texas Tech.

A transfer from Florida, Grier was a Manning Award Quarterback of the Week in 2015 as a Gator and then again earlier this season after throwing for 352 yards and five touchdowns in West Virginia’s September 9 win over East Carolina.

He was named the Big 12 Offensive Player of the Week and the Big 12 Newcomer of the Week for this week’s performance. Grier ranks first nationally (tied with Ohio State’s J.T. Barrett) with 21 touchdown passes. West Virginia returns to action on Saturday at Baylor at 7 p.m. CT.

Grier’s top competitors this week were North Texas’ Mason Fine and Baker Mayfield of Oklahoma. Fine completed 20-of-34 passes for 354 yards and three touchdowns, including a 22-yarder with 10 seconds to go to lift the Mean Green to a 29-26 win over UTSA as they remain perfect in C-USA action. Mayfield completed 17-of-27 passes for 302 yards and two touchdowns and played through a second-half injury to connect on a 59-yard scoring strike which proved to be the difference with 6:53 to go in a 29-24 win over Texas in the Red River Rivalry.

Facebook Voting

Ten Manning Award finalists will be announced on Thursday, November 30 and the winner is scheduled to be announced following the College Football Playoff National Championship.

Manning Award

In its first 13 years, the Manning Award has recognized the top names in college football. It has honored quarterbacks from 11 different schools and from four different conferences. The Southeastern Conference (Johnny Manziel, Cam Newton, JaMarcus Russell and Tim Tebow) and the Atlantic Coast Conference (Deshaun Watson twice, Matt Ryan and Jameis Winston) lead the way with four Manning Award wins each, while Texas is the only school with two different winners (Colt McCoy and Vince Young).

All the Manning Award winners follow in the footsteps of the Mannings themselves. In college, Archie, Peyton and Eli Manning combined for over 25,000 passing yards and 201 touchdowns while playing in 10 bowl games and earning four bowl MVP awards. Archie was the No. 2 pick in the NFL Draft, while both Peyton and Eli were selected No. 1 overall.

In addition to the Manning Award’s yearly honor, each week during the regular season, eight quarterbacks are recognized as Manning Quarterbacks of the Week. Sixty-one players from 59 different schools were honored during the 2016 season.