Syracuse, N.Y. — “Little league Kyle” is an alter ego of sorts that Fran Brown has tried to pull out of Syracuse football quarterback Kyle McCord since the two arrived at SU.
Brown remembers McCord’s little league days back in New Jersey. He was there.
The rest of Syracuse finally got to see what he means by “little league Kyle” on Saturday.
“Just playing free and having fun,” McCord said of what the idea embodies. “Not getting caught up on one mistake and letting that kind of ruin the drive. Just having short-term memory and letting it rip out there. I think that definitely came out today.”
McCord completed 32 passes for 381 yards and four touchdowns in the Orange’s win against Georgia Tech. He’s the first Syracuse quarterback since Ryan Nassib in 2012 to have multiple 300-yard, four-touchdown games.
The pass game wasn’t where “little league Kyle” manifested most, though.
That energy shone through on the sideline, where McCord fired up teammates with some strong language.
The bubble really popped when McCord scrambled for 15 yards up the sideline for the longest rush of his career and a Syracuse first down.
“The 3rd-and-3 scramble meant a lot to our program,” Brown said. “I’m always telling Kyle in practice when he’ll run inside, I’m cussing at him and chasing him, ‘You should be running. You’re afraid to run. I wanna see the little league Kyle McCord.’
“ ‘I’m not looking for this college guy that you think. I want the little league football player.’ ”
McCord said Georgia Tech’s man coverage on the play left no one accounting for him using his feet. With the wide receivers’ routes drawing defenders right, he had the left side of the field open for him.
When he finally got pressured out of bounds, McCord spiked the ball in celebration.
Brown laughed about it postgame but made it clear that was a no-no going forward.
“The spike, probably gotta reel in the emotions a little bit,” McCord said. “The ref probably could’ve thrown a flag there. We’re lucky that they didn’t. Regardless, I feel like that was a big conversion, especially at that point in the game.”
Syracuse didn’t score on the drive, but it did run out the clock on the third quarter with five more plays and a punt after the scramble.
Georgia Tech went scoreless in those 15 minutes. The Orange held a 10-point lead entering the fourth quarter.
McCord’s more than proved he was worth the name, image and likeness money Syracuse spent to help get his commitment.
Brown already joked in Week 1 he wanted to send Ohio State head coach Ryan Day champagne for letting McCord go.
He doubled down on it Saturday.
“I told my wife she needs to order it all and that needs to go out, fast,” Brown said.
McCord’s talent as a passer was already known. Though his totals against Ohio and and Georgia Tech each became a career-high, he averaged 264 yards per game last year through the air. His completion percentage (65.8%) was No. 24 in the country.
If he can keep tapping into the “little league Kyle” energy, though, McCord could prove a lot of people wrong by season’s end.
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