Danny O’Brien, who transferred from Maryland in June, has been named Wisconsin’s starting quarterback for its season opener against Northern Iowa, Badgers coach Bret Bielema announced via Twitter on Sunday.
It’s the second straight year that the Badgers’ opening-game quarterback is a transfer who became eligible to play immediately.
Last season, Russell Wilson became the starter after transferring from North Carolina State, and Russell was named All-Big Ten and led the Badgers to the conference title.
Now it’s O’Brien, who started 17 games the past two seasons for the Terps. He completed 56.4 percent of his passes in 2011 with seven touchdowns and 10 interceptions in nine games.
Like Wilson, O’Brien is eligible to play without sitting out a year because he has already graduated.
O’Brien, who has two years of eligibility remaining, beat out senior Curt Phillips and redshirt freshman Joel Stave for the starting job.
“Both Curt and Joel had great camps as well, we are very fortunate that we have 3 QB’s that can play winning football for us,” Bielema tweeted.