Locklan Hewlett is, right now, the No.3 quarterback on South Florida’s football team, so if everything goes according to plan, meaning if Byrum Brown stays healthy, you probably won’t hear from him this year. But that doesn’t mean you won’t hear from him.
Hewlett, a 6-foot-1, 190-pounder out of St. Augustine high, has already gotten the attention of the USF coaching staff even though he is just a freshman and hasn’t played a down in competition.
But he did play in USF’s spring game, sharing time with Bryce Archie, Brown’s back-up, and completing 13-of-14 passes for 110 yards and three touchdowns as Brown, still in somewhat of a healing mode after suffering a lower leg injury last year, was held out just to be on the safe side.
The spring game was just a sample of the kind of talent Hewlett displayed in high school, where he was a three-year starter and threw for 7,917 yards over the course of his career, including his senior season when he was 198-of-298, 66 percent, for 2,910 yards with 31 touchdowns and nine interceptions.
Rated as the No.52 quarterback in the country in On3’s industry rankings, Hewlett was sought by several schools including Miami, Pitt and Texas A-M before signing with Wake Forest.
But then, he decommitted from Wake Forest and switched to USF. According to On3, Hewlett said he decided on Wake Forest early in his recruitment and didn’t give himself enough time to think things through and that USF was a better fit.
“They play with tempo and play fast and that’s my style,” Hewlett told On3. “The future is really bright here,” he continued. “People are still sitting (on USF) but they’ll be awake soon,” Hewlett added.
Going into the season, USF is in an interesting position. The Bulls open against Boise State, which made the College Football Playoffs last year and is generally considered the standard by which other Group of 5 teams are judged.
Win that game and suddenly, USF has a chance to break out of the pack, move away from mediocrity to big boy status. Anything would be possible, even being the Group of 5 representative in the CFP. While that would still be a longshot, it would be possible.
Much of that, particularly on offense, would depend on Brown, and what happens to Brown will go a long way toward determining what happens to Hewlett. If Brown avoids injury, USF has a chance to make a serious run and Hewlett remains in the background, at least for this year.
But Hewlett has already shown enough so that if he continues to develop, he could pass Archie, a steady workman-like player who has experience but lacks Hewlett’s upside, as the team’s No.2 quarterback.
Right now, the plan would be to get Hewlett into four games, which would allow him to preserve his redshirt season and leave him with four years of eligibility.
But if Brown were to go down again USF might see Hewlett as giving it the best chance to win, particularly if it were in contention for a major bowl or post season play.
“Just in terms of attention to detail and the growth he has made as a young quarterback, for a young guy that just got here, man, he continues to be really, really special in a lot of ways,” USF Coach Alex Golesh said after the spring game.
“He’s a little baller and he’s fun to coach and we’ll see how his progression goes,” Golesh continued. “But I think he’s got a really bright future here.” The question is whether the future is now.
Even Archie, who played solidly as Brown’s replacement last year and, in some ways, saved USF’s season, has picked up positive vibes from Hewlett.
“He did nothing but come here and work,” Archie commented. “He didn’t really care about anything else. He was in the facility as much as I was. I’d get back from baseball practice (In addition to football, Archie is a pitcher on the USF baseball team) and he’d just be coming back from meetings with one of the coaches and I think that just showed on the field.
“Really, he came to the first practice; you know a lot of guys just expect a young quarterback to come in and just kind of look mediocre,” Archie said. “He didn’t.
“He came in and executed and I think it wowed a lot of people, even the coaches. He just put his head down and worked and it shows every day on the field.”
Without question, Brown is USF’s big gun. He has the ability to be one of the best quarterbacks in the country and that ability is going to get him noticed by Power 4 teams. If he has a big year, he could hit the transfer portal and if he leaves, then the quarterback spot is open and Hewlett just might fill it.
And while he may not be the next Byrum Brown, maybe he won’t have to be. Maybe being Locklan Hewlett will be good enough.
