ESPN Commentary

Originally Published: January 5, 2007

Leak faces defining moment as Gators' QB

Chris Leak has posted numbers since his freshman season, but the Gators needed someone they could follow and trust. It took four years, but they finally got him, writes Gene Wojciechowski.

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By Gene Wojciechowski
ESPN.com
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Leak Looks Back on Time at Florida

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Leak Looks Back on Time at Florida

PARADISE VALLEY, Ariz. -- Almost four years ago to the day, Chris Leak sat in the living room of his family's Charlotte, N.C., home and spoke with the easy, naive confidence of someone unaccustomed to failure. It all seemed so simple back then.

He was going to play football at the University of Florida, win the starting quarterback job as a true freshman, "and then win three or four national championships. If the Heisman Trophy happens, it happens. To win championships at Florida, that's the plan."

That's what Leak told a newspaper reporter by the name of Joe Schad, who now works for ESPN. At the time, Leak was football royalty, owner of 16 state individual records and the second-leading passer in the history of high school sports. During his senior season, he threw for 5,193 yards, a mind-boggling 65 touchdowns and led Independence High to its third consecutive state championship. Classmates and teachers alike asked for his autograph.

"He's just the perfect quarterback, your dream quarterback, a once-in-a-lifetime kind of cat," is how an opposing coach once described him.

Leak was part of the same recruiting class of 2003 that sent Reggie Bush to USC, JaMarcus Russell to LSU, Brady Quinn to Notre Dame, Mario Williams to North Carolina State and LaMarr Woodley to Michigan. So far, that class has produced the No. 1 and 2 picks in the 2006 NFL draft, and might do so again this year. But Leak won't be one of those two.

Todd Kirkland/Icon SMIChris Leak's improved leadership helped the Gators reach the BCS title game.

The head coach who so passionately recruited him, Ron Zook, was fired after only seven games in 2004. Too many five- and four-loss seasons did him in.

And that dream of four national titles never came true. Or three. Or two. Or one -- yet. Leak still has time to make good on the goal that matters most to him, but he'll have to lead the underdog Gators over No. 1-ranked Ohio State in Monday evening's Tostitos BCS National Championship Game.

Leak's career at Florida doesn't have the same dramatic twists as quarterback Troy Smith's sometimes tumultuous stay at Ohio State. Compared to some of the well-documented off-field decisions made by Smith in the past, Leak has been a football Boy Scout.

But Smith, who cleaned up his act, has a Heisman and a national championship ring. Meanwhile, Leak has a single conference title and until recently, the reputation as someone too serious, too reserved and too aloof for his own good. Only now, in his fourth and final season at Florida, has he done what his teammates and coaches always hoped he would do: assert himself, lighten up, and most of all, lead.

Nobody has ever doubted Leak's commitment to football. In high school, he didn't have time for Senior Prom or girlfriends. It hasn't been much different at Florida, where he spends more time watching film than some critics at Cannes.

But the Gators wanted … needed a guy who could do more than complete an out pass from the far hash mark. They needed someone they could follow and trust.

It took four years, but they finally got him.

The first sign of the new and improved Leak came earlier this season. Leak used to fly solo at the Gators' training table, but heads turned when the Florida senior began chirping at his teammates one day.

"He was cracking jokes and talking about everybody all loud," said wide receiver Andre Caldwell. "It's like, this is really Chris talking like this?"

Leak, usually content to let the Florida coaches get into players' grilles after mistakes, began confronting his teammates on the field. "He was more of a shy guy, thinking he could play his role and everything was all right," said Caldwell. "Now he's got control of everybody and the whole offense."

Strangely enough, it was true freshman quarterback Tim Tebow who helped pull Leak from his personality shell. The highly recruited Tebow plays as if his jockstrap is on fire, which was the exact opposite of the serene Leak. Tebow's personality (playful, eccentric, fired up) began to have an effect on Leak.

"Tim has made it OK for Chris to laugh and have fun at the game," said Florida offensive coordinator Dan Mullen.

Maybe, just maybe, the Leak of the past would have resented a true freshman's getting his very own package of specially designed plays. That's what Mullen does for Tebow each game and the results have been spectacular. And Leak, the team guy, hasn't said a peep.

"Chris has never stormed into my office and said, 'Hey, on fourth-and-1 I need to run the Iso play right up the middle,'" said Mullen. "He'll look at me and say, 'It looks pretty good for Tim to go do that.'"

James D. Smith/Icon SMIChris Leak has thrown for 2,729 yards and 22 touchdowns this season.

But below the surface of his comments, you can find bits and pieces of his true feelings. Ask him about adversity and he talks about the coaching change from Zook to Urban Meyer. Ask him about the criticism he's endured from Florida fans and media and he insists he's never paid attention to any of it. Ask him about the end of his Florida career and he becomes surprisingly nostalgic.

"I really still can't believe that four years have gone by that fast," he said. "But I've enjoyed my time here as a Gator. I've always enjoyed being a Gator and that never changed. I'll be a Gator the rest of my life."

It's hard to tell just yet where Leak fits into Florida football lore. Is he the great underachiever? The good soldier? The national championship quarterback? Monday evening's game will help answer all those questions.

"I think this is the season his career is going to be judged on," said Mullen.

Mullen's point is this: You can't judge Leak until now because of circumstances. He was a true freshman quarterback in the hyper-intense SEC. He was a sophomore quarterback for a coach who would get fired later that season. He was a junior quarterback with a new coach, new offensive coordinator and new system.

This season there are no asterisks and no excuses. Leak, by his sheer perseverance and remodeled personality, has earned the respect of his teammates and the Gators' coaching staff. But Meyer himself has said that a quarterback's legacy is defined by the number of championship rings he owns. If so, then Leak has one final opportunity to work on his jewelry collection.

"Throughout the years he's had so much pressure, up and down years," said Caldwell. "We were so happy to see him in a happy moment like … winning the SEC championship. We wanted him to be a quarterback to be remembered. That's how you judge quarterbacks, on championships. For him to get one, he's always going to be remembered. Hopefully, if we get this one for him, y'all definitely remember him then."

Win or lose, Leak won't be forgotten. A national championship could define him. So could a loss.

All anyone knows for sure is that Monday night's game is his last in a Florida uniform and that contrary to his breezy predictions of four years ago, nothing, absolutely nothing, has come easy for him. Who would have ever figured that?

Gene Wojciechowski is the senior national columnist for ESPN.com. You can contact him at gene.wojciechowski@espn3.com.