By RICK PETERSON
TopSports.news
Like virtually all freshmen, quarterback Logan Madden began his collegiate career towards the bottom of the Washburn Ichabods' depth chart.
Washburn redshirt freshman quarterback Logan Madden earned his first college start last Saturday, helping lead the Ichabods to a 37-17 home MIAA win over Central Missouri. [Photo courtesy of Washburn Athletics]
But after using a redshirt campaign to get accustomed to college football, the 6-foot-2, 200-pound Arvada, Colo. native worked his way into a chance to get on the field for the Ichabods this fall and has made the most of that opportunity, earning his first start in last Saturday's 37-17 MIAA win over Central Missouri in Yager Stadium.
"I feel like we had a very good fall camp and a very good spring season and I felt I performed well enough to give me a chance that at least, if the opportunity presented itself, that I was in the conversation to go in,'' Madden said. "My whole thought process was if I get a chance I've just got to take advantage of it and that's going to give me my next chance and the next chance and roll with it from there.
"Obviously, I practice every single time like I'm going to be the Day 1 guy, going to be the starter. I think our quarterback room really just has good competition, a healthy competition, and we all love each other. We all battled really hard in the spring and in the summer and the fall camp and we were all ready if the opportunity presented itself.''
Madden, whose father played baseball and mother played basketball at WU, came off the bench to make his college debut with a solid performance (11 of 17 passing for 150 yards and two touchdowns) in Game 3 at Colorado School of Mines and also played major minutes at Pittsburg State (14 of 28 for 142 yards and a TD) before earning his first start last week.
"I talked to coach (Dane) Simoneau (offensive coordinator) on Tuesday and he kind of gave me a nudge and said, 'Hey, you're going to be the guy to start off all the sessions in practice,' '' Madden said. "The reps continued during the week and I went out and got the start, so it was nice.''
"We just kind of set down with the offensive staff and said, 'Let's figure out what we're good at, let's figure out how we can move the ball, let's figure out how we can be efficient,' and we said that the quarterback that has the best practice and gives us the best chance to win would be the guy,' '' Washburn coach Zach Watkins said. "That was Logan and coach Simoneau and the offensive staff did a great job of getting him and the other quarterbacks ready to go.''
Madden took advantage of his chance, completing 20 of 31 passes for 231 yards and two touchdowns while also scoring the game's first TD on a 10-yard run as 2-5 Washburn notched its first MIAA victory of the season.
"When you win it's not just the quarterback effort of course, but the quarterback's got to drive it all and the quarterback has to be the driving factor in how you win and Logan did a great job in the game and all week in practice and it showed up on Saturday,'' Watkins said.
"I felt like I played my part,'' Madden said. "I think that obviously there's a lot of stuff that we need to clean up. Getting eight turnovers, we've got to put more points on the board because our defense was amazing. But I think that I just did my job and that's what you need to do and just take what they give us and go through our reads and hit the guys. The O-line helped me a lot and the receivers and the running backs were great all week, really encouraging me and making plays out there for me, so that was awesome.''
Now the goal for Madden is to continue building in Saturday's 1 p.m. home game against Fort Hays State (4-4 overall, 3-3 MIAA).
"When you're a young kid and can play a little bit in the Mines game and get some confidence and now you've started a game and we won that game, that should just help you keep progressing to better performance, better preparation, more comfortability and the ceiling is really high,'' Watkins said of Madden.
"They're a good team,'' Madden said of the Tigers. "Actually, I traveled last year as a redshirt and was on the sidelines doing some signals and stuff like that, so I was at the game last year and I know they got us pretty good (38-7), so I know they're a good team and coached very well.
"I think our game plan is good this week, but we're going to have to make plays.''
