ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Cam Ward made NCAA history in his final college game.
The Miami quarterback threw a record-setting 156th touchdown pass of his college career Saturday, connecting with Jacolby George for a 4-yard score with 4:12 left in the first quarter of the Pop-Tarts Bowl.
That’s the Division I — FBS and FCS — record, one more than Houston’s Case Keenum threw for from 2007 through 2011.
Ward may not hold the record for long. Oregon’s Dillon Gabriel — whose team could play as many as three games in the College Football Playoff — has 153 touchdown passes so far in his career, spanning six seasons at UCF, Oklahoma and now Oregon.
Either way, Ward is assured of finishing college with one of the top careers by any quarterback at any level.
He entered Saturday with 17,999 yards — 6,908 at Incarnate Word, 6,968 at Washington State and 4,123 at Miami — for the third-most in NCAA history behind only Keenum (19,217) and Gabriel (18,423).
And when it’s all done, Ward will be on the touchdown list for a while as well.
The all-division NCAA record is 162 touchdown passes by John Matocha from Division II’s Colorado School of Mines from 2019 through 2023.
Tyson Bagent of Division II’s Shepherd threw for 159 touchdowns from 2018 through 2022. Braxton Punk of Division III’s Mount Union threw for 158 from 2019 through 2023; North Central’s Luke Lehnen, whose team will play in the Division III national championship game next month, also has 158 in his career.
After them, Alex Tanney of Division III’s Monmouth is fifth with 157 touchdown passes from 2007 through 2011, and Ward’s first touchdown on Saturday put him alone in sixth on the NCAA list.
Ward rewrote Miami’s record book in 2024, his lone season with the Hurricanes. He will leave as Miami’s single-season leader in yards, completions and touchdown passes. He was on pace entering Saturday to leave as the Hurricanes’ leader in completion percentage — both for a season (65.8%, set in 2023 by Tyler Van Dyke) and for a career (64.3% by D’Eriq King in 2020 and 2021).
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