Miami QB Jacurri Brown to enter transfer portal, joining several departing Hurricanes teammates on Tuesday

From the day he arrived on campus from Lowndes High in Valdosta, Georgia, Miami Hurricanes QB Jacurri Brown tantalized everyone with his potential, what he some day could be. Very few quarterbacks have Brown’s athleticism to go along with signal-calling skills. He simply had to become an accurate passer and he would line up as the prototypical quarterback in the mold of Cam Newton — big, strong, fast and great.

But it is difficult to coach inconsistent accuracy, and Brown struggled to compete at the position from day 1 on Miami’s campus with Tyler Van Dyke, Jake Garcia, Emory Williams, and now Reese Poffenbarger too. The fact was that he exited spring practice as Miami’s No. 4 quarterback and had freshman Judd Anderson challenging him too. It was not the greatest position.

Tuesday Brown went looking for a new home, joining the madness of the portal with hundreds of other college football players and Miami teammates Henry Parrish, TreVonte’ Citizen, Nyjalik Kelly and Logan Sagapolu. Note that Brown’s paperwork is being processed before it will be considered official.

Brown redshirted last season, his second at UM, and saw action in just one game. It was as a starter for Miami in the 2023 Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl against Rutgers after Van Dyke headed for the portal himself and Williams was injured. Brown threw for 181 yards on 20-for-31 passing with one touchdown and one interception and rushed 15 times for 57 yards and two touchdowns.

Brown played in eight games as a freshman and made two starts. He threw for 230 yards on 27-for-45 passing (60.0 percent) with three touchdowns and three interceptions, adding 223 rushing yards, which was third most among all Miami players.

He made his career debut in Miami’s season opener against Bethune-Cookman (Sept. 3), completing one pass and then had 22 yards on two third-down carries with a long run of 19 yards in a win at Virginia Tech (Oct. 15). He had two yards on two carries and caught one pass for nine yards against Duke (Oct. 22), rushed for 28 yards on five carries in win at Virginia (Oct. 29), and led the team in rushing yards against Florida State (Nov. 5), finishing with 64 yards on 13 carries, including long run of 18 yards Brown completed 5-of-9 passes for 37 yards against Seminoles.

He finally made his first start in a win at Georgia Tech (Nov. 12), completing 14-of-19 passes for 136 yards with three touchdowns, with a long pass of 23 yards, while rushing for 87 yards on 19 carries, with a long run of 24 yards. That earned him the start at Clemson (Nov. 19), where he led the team in rushing yards with 22 on 10 carries and completed 6-of-13 pass attempts for 53 yards with long completion of 27 yards. Brown also saw action against Pittsburgh (Nov. 26), completing 2-of-3 passes.

In high school, Brown was a two-time all-state selection for Georgia 7A. He threw for 1,537 yards with 14 touchdown passes and rushed for more than 1,100 yards yards with 16 rushing touchdowns in breakout junior year. He finished his senior year with 1,537 passing yards, 1,101 rushing yards and 30 combined touchdowns (14 passing, 16 rushing). He picked Miami over Auburn, Florida, Ole Miss, Tennessee and West Virginia.

Now he will get a fresh start at a new school. But his challenges will undoubtedly remain the same. Brown will continue to work on his consistency and accuracy.