Former Eastern Washington quarterback Gage Gubrud has won an appeal for an additional year of eligibility and will spend his final season as a graduate transfer at Washington State.
WSU announced Gubrud, a two-time finalist for the Walter Payton Award, given to the best offensive player in FCS, joined the program Saturday morning.
And the final piece of the Class of 2019 is in! Welcome to the WSU Cougar Family, @Gagegubs! #GoCougs #JoinTheHunt
— WSU Cougar Football (@WSUCougFB) February 9, 2019
“We are excited for Gage to come in and compete with the quarterbacks on our team,” head coach Mike Leach said. “He is an extremely experienced and productive player who led Eastern Washington to great heights in his time there. It’s not often that you can add a quarterback to your roster that has started 28 games and thrown for nearly 10,000 yards. We are looking forward to getting him on campus and finishing his collegiate career in a WSU Cougar uniform.”
Gubrud suffered a toe injury in the Eagles’ fifth game in 2018 that sidelined him for the remaining 10 games of the season and was initially denied a medical redshirt, according to the Spokesman-Review. However, because EWU advanced to the FCS national championship game, Gubrud ended up appearing in just one-third of the team’s game, qualifying him for a medical redshirt under NCAA rules.
In 32 games over parts of four seasons, Gubrud threw for 9,984 yards with 87 touchdown passes and 32 interceptions for the Eagles. He threw for 5,160 yards in 2016 and was honored by the Touchdown Club of Columbus as the FCS Player of the Year. That season, in Gubrud’s first collegiate start, he completed 34 of 40 passes for 474 yards and five touchdowns in a 45-42 win at Washington State.
It’s the second straight season WSU will welcome a graduate transfer at quarterback, following Gardner Minshew’s successful move from East Carolina to Wazzu in 2018. Minshew finished fifth in the Heisman Trophy voting, while leading the Cougars to a school-record 11 wins.
In addition to Gubrud, the competition to replace Minshew is expected to primarily include Trey Tinsley, Anthony Gordon, Cammon Cooper and Gunner Cruz.