Jalen Hurts

Jalen Hurts (born August 7, 1998) is an American football quarterback for the Alabama Crimson Tide.

Early years

Hurts' parents are Pamela and Averion Hurts. Hurts has two siblings, his younger sister Kynnedy and his older brother, named after their father, Averion. Hurts' older brother is currently the starting quarterback for Texas Southern University in his senior year. Their parents still attend Jalen and Averion's football games every week.^[1]Hurts attended Channelview High School in Channelview, Texas. Hurts' father, Averion, was the football coach of Channelview High School throughout his sons' high school careers. As a senior he passed for 2,384 yards with 26 touchdown passes and rushed for 1,391 yards and 25 touchdowns. Hurts was a second-team all-district selection as a sophomore and was named the District 21-6A Overall MVP as a junior during his high school playing years. He played against the Texas A & M freshman standout running back Trayveon Williams throughout his high school career. Hurts was rated as a four-star recruit and was ranked among the top dual-threat quarterbacks in his class.^[2] Although Texas A & M made a strong push to recruit Hurts after the departure of their starting quarterback, Kyler Murray, they failed and Hurts proceeded to commit to the University of Alabama on June 5th, 2015 after being recruited by Defensive Line Coach Bo Davis and Offensive Coordinator Lane Kiffin.^[3] Hurts finished high school academically ranking 39th in his class. Throughout high school, Hurts also participated in powerlifting. As a sophomore in high school, Hurts was squatting 500 pounds of weight. He would eventually become Regional Finalist in the Powerlifting 198 pound weight class.^[4]

College career

As a freshman at Alabama in 2016, Hurts competed to open the season as the starting quarterback.^[5][6] Blake Barnett would start the first game but by the second game Hurts had taken over the role. He became the first true freshman to start at quarterback for Alabama in 30 years.^[7] Hurts produced a historic freshman season under head coach Nick Saban. He threw for 2,454 yards and 21 touchdowns with only nine interceptions. His completion percentage was at 65.9 percent and he finished the regular season with a quarterback rating of 147.14. He rushed for a total of 840 yards and 12 touchdowns. Hurts broke the Alabama single season record for rushing yards by a quarterback, surpassing Steadman Shealy's previous record of 791 yards. He finished the season with 33 overall touchdowns for the entire year, which is second all-time in Alabama football. Only Blake Sims has more touchdowns in a single season for the Crimson Tide with a total of 35 touchdowns.^[8] Hurts became the first quarterback coached by Nick Saban to rush for more than 11 touchdowns in a single season. He was the first player in Alabama history to pass for 300 yards and rush for 100 yards in the same game and the first quarterback to rush for 120 yards or more in multiple games. In the Iron Bowl game against Auburn, Hurts completed 75% of his passes which set a new Iron Bowl record.^[9] Alabama concluded its 2016-2017 regular season with a perfect 12-0 (8-0 SEC) record. On November 30, 2016, Hurts was declared as one out of the ten finalists for the Manning Award which is given to the nation's top college quarterback. On Dec 3, 2016 he led his team to win the 2016 SEC Championship against the Florida Gators.

References

External links

• Alabama Crimson Tide bio