IU QB battle 'hasn't moved the needle' yet, but Dexter Williams could return in 2023

BORDEN – What Tom Allen has at quarterback, he plans to hold — and likely not add to — with a decision on his starting quarterback for the 2023 season still waiting until fall camp.

Searching for his No. 1 behind center since Connor Bazelak and Jack Tuttle moved on last winter, Allen split most of Indiana’s first-team snaps in spring practice between redshirt freshmen Brendan Sorsby, a member of IU’s 2022 signing class who arrived last summer, and Tayven Jackson, the Center Grove standout who transferred in from Tennessee in January. Early enrollee true freshman Broc Lowry also got work during spring.

Allen repeated throughout camp he expected the competition to run into preseason, and the summer months would help separate a leader among the group. Speaking Wednesday at IU’s annual booster dinner at Huber’s Winery and Orchard in Borden, Allen didn’t deviate from that message.

“Haven’t moved the needle on that one,” he said of selecting a starting quarterback. “Been pretty clear as far as the process we’re gonna go through on that. We’ve got two more months of summer, and then fall camp will really be the deciding factor.”

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Allen doesn’t anticipate adding to that competition between now and fall camp, either through further transfers or a premature return from injury for Dexter Williams.

Even as the Hoosiers recruited and ultimately signed Jackson, they remained linked to a handful of other quarterbacks looking for new opportunities in the portal this cycle. Oregon State transfer Chance Nolan, who wound up at TCU, was among them.

Allen admitted Wednesday he knew from the beginning another transfer would be a difficult needle to thread — a player to backstop one of Indiana’s younger arms with the insurance of experience in case of injury, but also one comfortable with a reserve role.

IU never found that player and, by now, Allen said it’s likely the Hoosiers never will.

“We talked about that,” Allen said. “I had an interest in that as really just more of an insurance policy. But it’s not like the NFL where you just get a guy off the wire. This guy would need to fit and want to be in that role and understand the situation.

“With the younger guys that we have, we felt those guys would be where our starter’s going to come from.”

Allen could eventually realize added depth in Williams’ return by the end of the coming season, something he did not initially consider possible.

Williams’ knee injury, suffered in the first half of IU’s season-ending loss to Purdue, was initially described to Allen as similar to one Teddy Bridgewater suffered in 2016, playing for the Minnesota Vikings. Bridgewater’s injury was reported as not just an ACL tear, but also a knee dislocation causing further structural damage to the joint.

When Williams underwent surgery to repair the injury, Allen said Wednesday, doctors discovered while the ACL was torn and other ligaments in Williams’ knee suffered damage, it was not as extensive as they had initially feared.

Williams’ injury was initially reported by the program as a knee dislocation causing significant structural damage to his right knee. He had also previously suffered an ACL tear in his left knee, an injury which held Williams out of the 2021 season.

“I think (the knee was) a little cleaner than they thought,” Allen said. “They don’t really know until they get in there. That’s created the optimism that he might have a little bit less of a timetable.”

Allen described Williams as ahead of schedule in his rehabilitation. Williams was cleared to begin running in April, and Allen said he’s increasingly hopeful Williams could play some part in the season to come.

Its coach emphasized Indiana won’t rush Williams back recklessly. If the opportunity presents itself, Williams could eventually support whichever of those two redshirt freshmen win the starting job, perhaps in the latter part of 2023.

“It’s kind of gone from probably going to be out the whole season to hey, he might be now where he can be ready later in the season, now it’s halfway through the season,” Allen said. “That’s optimistic, without question, but he’s such a great worker and he’s so disciplined in the process, it doesn’t surprise me, especially once we found out maybe there weren’t quite as many things as we thought when the injury occurred. …

“He’s just been so disciplined to the process of rehabbing that if he can come back a little early, he’s the right guy to do that. We’ll see. We’ll never rush it. Right now, we’re trying to get him to the halfway point (of the season) and see if he’ll be ready to go at that point.”

Follow IndyStar reporter Zach Osterman on Twitter: @ZachOsterman.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Indiana football: Tayven Jackson in mix, Dexter Williams could return