Danny Wuerffel

Daniel Carl Wuerffel (born May 27, 1974) is an American former football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL).

He played college football for the Florida Gators, where he was a prolific passer under head coach Steve Spurrier.

Wuerffel was born in Pensacola, Florida, in 1974, the son of a Lutheran minister who was a chaplain in the U.S. Air Force.

While he was growing up, his family and he lived in South Carolina, Spain, Nebraska, and Colorado before he attended Fort Walton Beach High School in Fort Walton Beach, Florida.

Wuerffel was a standout high school football and basketball player for the Fort Walton Beach Vikings.

Wuerffel had first become involved with the organization while playing for the Saints in the late 1990s, and as the organization attempted to recover from the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, he became its executive director.

Under Wuerffel, Desire Street Ministries moved its headquarters to Atlanta and expanded its programs to other inner cities in the American South.

In football, he led the Vikings to an undefeated season as a senior quarterback, while winning the Florida Class 4A state football championship in 1991 and earning the number two national ranking in USA Today.

Wuerffel was widely considered the top high school football recruit in the state of Florida, and USA Today's high school player of the year in Florida during his senior year.

He graduated from high school as his class co-valedictorian.

Wuerffel accepted an athletic scholarship to attend the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, where he played quarterback for head coach Steve Spurrier's Florida Gators football team from 1993 to 1996.

One of the most decorated players in Florida's football history, he was a key member of the Gators teams that won four consecutive Southeastern Conference titles between 1993 and 1996.

The 1993 season was the first in which the Gators were ranked in the AP top 10 every week.

In the second week, quarterbacks Wuerffel and Terry Dean throw a total of seven interceptions against Kentucky.

With eight seconds left, Wuerffel threw a pass down the middle to walk-on receiver Chris Doering for the game-winning touchdown; Gator play-by-play announcer Mick Hubert shouted, "Doering's got a touchdown!"

The next week, Florida recovered and defeated Heath Shuler-led and fifth-ranked Tennessee 41–34 in a "shootout".

Wuerffel had split playing time with fellow quarterback Terry Dean for much of the 1993 and 1994 seasons.

Wuerffel led the NCAA in touchdown passes in 1995 and 1996 and set numerous school and conference records during his career.

With Dean graduated, Wuerffel was the clear starter coming into the 1995 season, and he made the most of his opportunity.

The Gators went through the regular season undefeated, and Wuerffel set several Southeastern Conference (SEC) and NCAA records for passing, including the SEC season record for touchdown passes and the NCAA record for passing efficiency.

Highlights included a September win over rival Tennessee in which Florida rallied from a 30–14 deficit to win 62-37 behind Wuerffel's SEC record 6 touchdown passes.

Sports Illustrated had sent a team of reporters to cover the top-10 matchup and had planned to put Tennessee quarterback Peyton Manning on the cover.

However, after the Gators' win, they decided to put Wuerffel on the cover instead, bringing him his first major national attention.

He led the Gators to the Bowl Alliance National Championship game following the 1995 season, but ultimately lost 62–24 to the Nebraska Cornhuskers in the Fiesta Bowl.

Wuerffel was a first-team All-American in 1995, and a consensus first-team All-American in 1996.

He received the Sammy Baugh Trophy in 1995, the Davey O'Brien Award in 1995 and 1996, and the Johnny Unitas Golden Arm Award in 1996, and was named the Quarterback of the Year by the Touchdown Club of Columbus in 1996.

Wuerffel declined to be included on Playboy magazine's All-America team as well as its Scholar-Athlete of the Year award, saying, "That's not the type of person I am or would like to portray myself as."

His Gators teammates picked him as the squad's most valuable player in 1995 and 1996; his coaches chose him as one of the Gators' team captains.

During his senior year in 1996, he won the Heisman Trophy while leading the Gators to their first national championship.

Wuerffel won the 1996 Heisman Trophy, as the outstanding college football player in America, while quarterbacking the Gators into their second consecutive Bowl Alliance national championship game with help from teammates Fred Taylor at running back; Reidel Anthony, Ike Hilliard, and Jacquez Green at wide receiver; and Jeff Mitchell on the offensive line.

Wuerffel and the Gators won the 1996 national championship in decisive fashion by defeating the Florida State Seminoles 52–20 in the Sugar Bowl.

After graduating from the University of Florida, he was selected in the 1997 NFL Draft by the New Orleans Saints.

He spent six years in the league with four teams, including the Green Bay Packers, the Chicago Bears and the Washington Redskins, though his playing time and on-field success in the NFL was limited.

He was later named to The Gainesville Sun's Florida Gators Team of the Century in 1999, was chosen by the Sun as the number one player in the first 100 years of Gators football, and was listed as a member of the Florida Gators 100th Anniversary Team in 2006.

Wuerffel also played one season in NFL Europe, where he led the Rhein Fire to a league championship in World Bowl 2000.

After retiring from professional football, Wuerffel returned to New Orleans to work with Desire Street Ministries, a nonprofit organization that seeks to help impoverished neighborhoods through spiritual and community development.

Wuerffel graduated from the university with a bachelor's degree in public relations, and was inducted into the University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame as a "Gator Great" in 2006.

On September 30, 2006, Wuerffel was inducted into the Gator Football Ring of Honor alongside his former coach Spurrier and two other former Gator players, Jack Youngblood and Emmitt Smith.

In 2013, he was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Wuerffel was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 2013.