If Kentucky football’s 2024 recruiting class goes according to plan, the Wildcats will have found their quarterback of the future and the present. The Wildcats officially signed four-star Lexington Christian Academy quarterback Cutter Boley on Wednesday as part of a high school signing class ranked 24th nationally by the 247Sports Composite.
That news came less than 24 hours after UK confirmed the addition of Georgia quarterback transfer Brock Vandagriff, a former five-star high school recruit, as the headliner of a transfer class ranked ninth nationally by 247Sports. After serving as a backup to Stetson Bennett and Carson Beck for three seasons at Georgia, Vandagriff entered the transfer portal in search of a starting opportunity. He should have that at Kentucky with current starter Devin Leary playing his last college game in the Gator Bowl.
But Boley is also planning to enroll at UK in January with eyes on ending Kentucky’s long high school quarterback recruiting drought. “I just think (Boley) is the perfect fit for us,” UK recruiting coordinator Vince Marrow said Wednesday. “You have to bring in an older guy (too). It’s not fair to put all that on him. Now, if he comes in and blows us away, then it’s a blessing, but I do believe he’s going to be a guy that is going to be the future of this program.” Vandagriff will almost certainly be the third consecutive transfer quarterback to start for Kentucky, following the path of Will Levis and Leary. Like Levis did when he arrived at UK as a transfer from Penn State, Vandagriff has two seasons of eligibility remaining.
If Vandagriff stays at UK for both those seasons, following Levis’ path of developing into an early round NFL draft prospect, he would leave just as Boley is moving into his sophomore season on campus. “The nice thing is with (offensive coordinator) Liam (Coen) and what he does, I think he definitely draws attention,” UK coach Mark Stoops said.
“There’s people that are very interested in our program, which excites us. I think a guy like Brock, what you can see at that point and the fact you know he’s coming from an offense where they do a lot of things very well and are extremely well trained and work hard and have all the intangibles that you’re looking for, it makes a difference.
” While Vandagriff only played sparingly in blowouts at Georgia — including the win over Kentucky this season — the offense he learned there should be closer to the pro-style scheme Coen runs at Kentucky than the one Leary ran at N.C. State before transferring to UK. The hope is that familiarity will lessen some of the operational miscues that plagued Kentucky’s offense this season.
Prioritizing Vandagriff in the transfer portal quarterback market was a return to the formula that saw Kentucky land Levis prior to the 2021 season, during Coen’s first stint as UK offensive coordinator. Neither quarterback had played significant snaps at their previous school, but both boasted the type of physical traits that made it easier to project them as future professionals.
“When (Vandagriff) came on his official visit, I think if you would have just locked him in a room him and Coach Coen would have just talked football all day long and been just fine with that,” Stoops said. “He’s definitely a football guy.
Extremely talented player and very excited about him.” If Vandagriff develops into an NFL draft pick at Kentucky, the Wildcats’ appeal to future transfer quarterbacks will only grow, but Stoops and Coen have been up front about the importance of establishing a pipeline of high school quarterbacks since Coen returned to UK from the Los Angeles Rams last winter.
No high school player recruited to UK as a quarterback has started for a Wildcats team with a winning record since Morgan Newton in 2009. Injuries have played a role in previous highly touted high school quarterbacks failing to pan out during Stoops’ tenure, but the staff also has missed on some of its evaluations at the position.
What makes Boley different?
“He has all the intangibles you’re looking for,” Stoops said. “He has all the physical attributes that you look for. Really had a great year. He’s just a guy we can build around.”
Kentucky already holds a commitment from four-star Pennsylvania prep quarterback Stone Saunders in the 2025 high school class. Stoops alluded to Saunders’ commitment — NCAA rules prohibit him from talking about underclassmen specifically — in voicing optimism that a new era of quarterback recruiting has arrived in Lexington.
“I think that was clearly a priority for us,” Stoops said. “I think it was clearly a priority when Liam came back, to go zero in on a ‘24 quarterback. To get Cutter, who we’ve been recruiting for years and years was very important. Now we want to continue to do that with high school quarterbacks.”
Of course, signing talented high school quarterbacks and keeping them on campus long enough to develop are two different challenges.
Vandagriff’s own transfer is a reminder that there is no shortage of quarterbacks looking for a starting job after being blocked at their first program in the transfer portal each season. That makes maintaining depth at the position more difficult, as UK learned when backups Kaiya Sheron and Destin Wade both entered the portal as it became apparent UK was pursuing Vandagriff. UK will welcome Lexington native Beau Allen, who started his career at UK before transferring when Levis locked down the starting job, back to the roster as a walk-on transfer in the spring.
Allen’s familiarity with Coen’s offense makes him a strong candidate to provide depth behind Vandagriff and an insurance policy if Boley takes longer to adapt to the college game, but the current college football landscape makes it a fool’s errand to pencil in quarterbacks of the future under the assumption they will wait multiple seasons to take over a starting job.
Kentucky will take that headache if it means both Vandagriff and Boley have backed up their recruiting hype. “I don’t think there’s any question that what we do attracts quarterbacks because they know it’s going to get them ready (for the NFL),” Stoops said. “With the terminology and how complex we are in what we do, it definitely helps. Then there’s areas, as I’ve mentioned, that we want to improve and we’ve got to adjust. We have to keep up with things and be current as well.”
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