IOWA CITY — Brayden Santibanez’s statistics as a junior are not eye-popping.
Santibanez, a 3-star quarterback from Collierville High School in Tennessee, committed to Iowa football in April. His pledge gave the Hawkeyes a quarterback in the 2027 high school recruiting class.
Santibanez is coming off a junior season in which he totaled 1,140 passing yards, 13 touchdowns to five interceptions and a completion percentage of around 66%. He added another 321 yards and five scores on the ground.
It was not a bad season whatsoever. But for someone bound for a Big Ten program, Santibanez’s numbers as a junior were not overly impressive.
Here’s the story as to why.
In more than 20 years as a high school head coach, this was the closest quarterback battle Joe Rocconi had seen. The competition was between Santibanez, a junior, and Cayson Stanford, a senior. Neither could separate himself in the spring or summer leading up to the 2025 season.
Because of that, Collierville made an unconventional decision to go with a dual-quarterback system. There were some exceptions to it, but as a general rule Santibanez and Stanford simply alternated series.
“We told them at the beginning of the year, we’re not sure how this is going to go,” said Rocconi, Collierville’s head coach. “But we need your patience and we just need y’all to trust us and let it make you better.”
The closeness of the quarterback race was later reinforced by the fact that their season statistics were eerily similar. “It was kind of crazy how it ended up,” Rocconi said. But the setup produced results. Collierville went 9-4 and scored 35 or more points in 11 of its 13 games, including four contests of at least 56 points.
“It was good to see him go through that and good to see how he handled it,” Rocconi said of Santibanez. “With some ups and downs, of course. And like I said earlier, he didn’t like it. And neither did the other guy. But frankly, if he liked it, I wouldn’t like it. I was glad he didn’t like it. I didn’t want him to like it. But to be able to handle it how he handled it in front of his teammates, in the meeting rooms, when we were talking with quarterbacks.
“Really, it just boils down to: The kid cares about his team, he cares about the program, and he wants to win. I know it sounds cliché, but I wasn’t worried about him in that way because I knew that’s always been his base. He’s a competitive kid. He wants to win. He does care about our football team. So when you keep those things first, it can help you manage going through some adversity like that. But going through that adversity, I believe really, really helped his game.”
Rocconi believes the experience also will benefit Santibanez in the long run.
“One of the things we talked about, me and him, to prepare for this was, ‘Hey, man, I think you’re a big-time college quarterback and I know you’re sitting there going, well, then why aren’t I the solo starter?” Rocconi said. “But what do you think is going to happen when you go to a big-time college, you know? Every day’s a competition. You’re going to be battling with other guys just like you every single day.’”
Despite not being the full-time quarterback as a junior, Santibanez still garnered recruiting attention, earning offers from North Carolina, Cincinnati, Iowa State, Iowa, Kansas State and others. Santibanez possesses compelling physical tools. He is listed at 6-foot-3, 205 pounds, and runs a 4.56 40-yard dash.
“He’s going to be a great dual-threat guy,” Rocconi said. “I’m always careful with saying that because I think a lot of times, maybe high school coaches, maybe college coaches, maybe reporters, when they say dual threat, it kind of can come across like, well, he’s not a great thrower, not a great passer, he’s a better runner than he is a thrower. He’s not that. I think he can sit in the pocket and be effective and be dangerous, and I also feel like when he does decide to run or when he needs to move in the pocket or outside the pocket, he can be very dangerous, too.”
Mark Gronowski’s lone season at Iowa showed the value of having a mobile quarterback. Gronowski finally delivered the Hawkeyes the quality quarterback play that the program had been starving for. There’s hope that Iowa’s quarterbacks room under offensive coordinator Tim Lester is being well-positioned for the future. Though he still has his senior season at Collierville ahead of him, Santibanez is set to join a young crop of Iowa quarterbacks that includes Jimmy Sullivan, Ryan Fitzgerald and Tradon Bessinger.
“He’s easy to talk to, but he’s got a competitive drive,” Rocconi said of Santibanez. “That’s actually another thing I had to kind of let coaches know. Because you meet him and you go, all right, fun to talk to, easy to talk to, but sometimes coaches want to see that drive. They want to see some fierceness, I guess, when you’re having a conversation with them … I think he has a rare ability to be cool and be calm and composed and be laid-back when he needs to be laid-back. But by no means is he laid-back with his competitive spirit. He’s one of the most competitive kids on our team. So, I think he does a good job of balancing those two things and flipping the switch when he needs to flip the switch.”
Santibanez is slated to be the starter for Collierville this upcoming season. It will be Santibanez’s first time as the full-time quarterback at the varsity level. That’s part of what makes Santibanez’s future so enticing. He might just be scratching the surface of his potential.
“I’m very high on his ceiling,” Rocconi said. “I just think his best days are way ahead of him.”
Follow Tyler Tachman on X @Tyler_T15, contact via email at TTachman@usatodayco.com
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: What Iowa football is getting in ‘dual-threat’ QB Brayden Santibanez
Reporting by Tyler Tachman, Des Moines Register / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
