Fresno State names E.J. Warner starting quarterback for 2025 season

FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- Fresno State football has a new QB 1 at the helm: EJ Warner.

"EJ's done a great job with the communication piece, leadership piece, poise and experience he provides to our offense was critical," head coach Matt Entz said.

The Rice and Temple transfer has moved up the ranks and set himself apart throughout fall camp.

"Pre-snap plans ended up showing its face a bit and upon the snap execution and how we're distributing the ball, handling the blitzes. He's very prompt and knows where he wants to go with the ball," offensive coodinator, Josh Davis stated. "EJ is really good. He's played a lot of snaps, very heads up IQ distributor. He earned it."

Warner is the son of pro football Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner, and like his dad, he'll be sporting the number 13 with a highly competitive spirit.

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"He's hard on himself. He wants to win at everything he does, whether that's cornhole in the locker room, ping pong, or he's playing pick-up basketball with our DBs in the offseason," Davis said.

Warner's hard work paid off as he beat out Sacramento State transfer Carson Conklin and Clovis-native Jayden Mandal in a tight quarterback battle this summer.

"Jayden Mandal is playing really good football. He's healthy, accurate and fast," Davis explained. "Felt like Carson's body of work over fall camp was really sharp. We call bad plays, we need quarterbacks that can distribute and find targets, and Carson proved that he's a winner and we got three of them in our room."

Entz says he told them the decision Monday morning and it was "close."

"Both Jayden and Carson have to push him every day. I don't want EJ to get comfortable. That's the last thing I want. That's the last thing this program needs right now is someone at the quarterback position just thinking they're owned something," Entz said. "EJ knows that I don't want to call it a short leash, but we're going to be making sure that he's executing at a satisfactory level."

Without giving away any game plans, Entz says Conklin and Mandal may still be in the mix.

"If we have three young men that can help us win, it would be silly not to utilize them," he stated.

ESPN's Pete Thamel reports a strong conviction in the Bulldog's quarterback room has emerged, with a belief the team can win games this season with all three quarterbacks.

The team has not yet named an official backup quarterback.

"We'll find out a lot about our football team in the next week or so," he said.

ESPN contributed to this report.

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