Making the case for why Louisville's Tyler Shough could be 2024's Michael Penix Jr.

Tyler Shough will play for his third program in his seventh season at Louisville this fall. He has had his moments at points throughout those previous stops but some are now starting to wonder if his final one could be where he truly breaks out.

On3’s Andy Staples and Jesse Simonton discussed several quarterbacks, including Shough, during ‘Andy Staples On3’ on Tuesday morning. As he was sharing his thoughts about Shough, Staples asked a question in the form of a comparison. If that analogy is eventually true, it could mean big things for the Cardinals’ new quarterback.

“The question I ask for Tyler Shough is could he be this year’s Michael Penix Jr. from 2022 when he finally had a healthy season?” Staples pondered.

“It was his first year with Kalen DeBoer in Washington. He’d had all the injuries at Indiana. All of a sudden? He blossoms because he’s healthy for once and he’s working with a quarterback guru who can help him along,” said Staples. “That could be Tyler Shough this year.”

Simonton agreed in the sense that the experience he has will only help him in 2024. That’s certainly the case considering that he’ll be arriving at Louisville as the expected starter for Jeff Brohm next season.

“Shough is on that medical school timeline. I think he has been in college for about seven, eight years now,” joked Simonton. “If not now, when? That’s an intriguing one.”

“He’s one of many, many transfers who – I don’t know. You can’t say that they’ve been guaranteed the job but they are moving to a new school where they are the presumed starter,” said Simonton.

Shough has spent the past six years at Oregon from 2018 to 2020 and Texas Tech from 2021 to 2023. In 27 appearances as a Duck and Red Raider, he has completed 63.2% of his passes for 4,625 yards, 36 touchdowns, and 17 interceptions. That included his time starting in Eugene in 2020 when Oregon won the Pac-12, albeit at 4-3 during the pandemic. It also includes his chances in Lubbock over the past two seasons when he wasn’t dealing with injuries.

Shough then chose to transfer again and ended up at Louisville less than a month later. As the No. 30 QB and No. 259 player out of the portal, he was the first commit, and only quarterback, out of the 26 additions that the program made which make up the No. 1 class of transfers.

If you look at Penix Jr.’s career, he followed a similar path to the one that Shough is currently on. He had one less school and one less year but, nonetheless, transferred to a new program after four years with the Hoosiers. That’s when his career took a massive leap based on what we know he was as a Husky.

Will Shough have the same success as Louisville as Penix Jr. did in Seattle? Who knows. Only time will tell ahead of next season and come kickoff.

Enough of the plot beats match up, though, for this transfer to potentially work out in similar fashion, even if it doesn’t fully reach the exact same heights.