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Thursday, March 28
The Indiana Daily Student

sports football

From watch lists to working with MVP's: Nate Sudfeld deals with a high profile summer

Junior defensive end Nick Mangieri, left, and junior quarterback Nate Sudfeld celebrate after beating Missouri, 31-27, on Saturday at Faurot Field in Columbia, Mo.

The amount of attention on senior quarterback Nate Sudfeld has been simmering as the summer drags on.

It could have begun with him being named to award watch lists for the Maxwell Award and Wuerfell Trophy. Maybe it started to heat up when he was selected to be one of two players speaking at the Big Ten Kickoff Luncheon at the end of the month in Chicago.

But in the past week, Sudfeld has worked with Super Bowl-winning quarterbacks Peyton and Eli Manning at their passing academy in Louisiana and Indianapolis Colts quarterback Andrew Luck at his Change the Play camp Sunday at IU.

The platform on which Sudfeld stands has been rising in prominence as he attempts to return from a season-ending shoulder injury.

At the Manning Passing Academy, he did not waste the opportunity to learn from such respected quarterbacks and coaches.

It was incredible,” Sudfeld said. “I just tried to soak up as much information as I could from Peyton and Eli, (Saints) coach Sean Payton.”

He asked questions and spoke with the quarterbacks about the game but said watching them work was what stood out. He admired the way they operated and their attention to detail.

He was one of 37 college quarterbacks to work as a counselor at the camp. The list was full of high-profile members including TCU’s Trevone Boykin and Penn State’s Christian Hackenberg. In a quarterback challenge between the counselors in which players had to throw at moving targets at different distances, Sudfeld finished second to Seth 
Russell of Baylor.

“That was one of the funnest parts,” Sudfeld said. “I was really looking forward to that and kinda stacking myself up to the premier quarterbacks in college and felt like I did really well.”

One of Sudfeld’s old targets and current Denver Broncos receiver Cody Latimer even posted on Instagram Manning spoke well of Sudfeld’s performance at the camp.

Then came the Change the Play camp with Andrew Luck on Sunday. This was not a setting for the two quarterbacks to directly work together but a chance for Sudfeld to pick the brain of another football mind for the second year in a row.

He said Luck is a class act, a person who does everything right and doesn’t let things get too big. The simple life Luck attempts to lead is something Sudfeld looks up to. But he also studies Luck’s on-the-field abilities in film.

So as the Big Ten Kickoff Luncheon nears, the California-native is dealing with the honor of representing not just IU, but the Big Ten as a whole.

“I’ve really got about 30 ideas that I’m trying to fit into five minutes,” 
Sudfeld said.

He doesn’t want to talk much about his injury. That’s not because he doesn’t feel comfortable, but because he realizes everyone suffers injuries. In his mind, that doesn’t make him special.

He said he wants to talk about the honor of playing in the Big Ten and how his recent trip to Uganda changed his perspective on the world.

“I’m very humbled and honored to get that 
opportunity.”

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