Foles set to face old friend Cousins
• By Jim Thomas
http://www.stltoday.com/sports/foot...cle_21d6c60b-26dd-5db6-9b13-6029001de3f7.html
The record shows that quarterback Nick Foles was selected in the third round of the 2012 draft by Philadelphia out of the University of Arizona.
But there was a time, in 2007, when Foles sat in a quarterback meeting room at Michigan State. A room that included Brian Hoyer and Kirk Cousins.
OK, we’re not talking Marino, Montana and Elway there, although Cousins and Foles are still young in their NFL careers and Foles already has made a Pro Bowl.
But consider the fact that there were only 32 people on the planet who had the title last week of “opening-day NFL starting quarterback.” And three of them were sitting together in that meeting room eight years ago at Michigan State.
Who could’ve known?
“You don’t really know,” Foles said. “I knew Kirk was extremely talented, Brian was extremely talented, and me — I was just trying to rehab my shoulder. I had shoulder surgery, but at that time, you don’t realize that it’s three guys that’ll start in the NFL in the future.
“Right there, you’re just trying to be a college quarterback that can help a team. That’s all you’re really thinking about.”
Hoyer has been benched after just one start for the Houston Texans, giving way to Ryan Mallett. As for Foles and Cousins, they’re squaring off Sunday at FedEx Field when the Rams (1-0) visit Washington (0-1). It’s a noon kickoff (St. Louis time).
“Kirk’s a tremendous competitor,” Foles said. “He’s a really intelligent guy. I really enjoyed my time there with him (at Michigan State) and I’m not surprised at all with the success he’s had.
“Just going through the adversity he experienced at Michigan State. Just the man he’s become, the player’s he’s become, it doesn’t surprise me everything he’s gone through now to be the starting quarterback in Washington.”
Foles went through some adversity of his own in East Lansing, Mich. Coming off shoulder surgery following his senior season of high school, Foles appeared in only one game for the Spartans in 2007, completing five of eight passes for 57 yards against Alabama-Birmingham.
With Hoyer and Cousins both coming back in ’08, that quarterback room got even more crowded when Keith Nichol transferred in from Oklahoma. Couple that with homesickness, and Foles faced an early-life crisis: Should he stay at Michigan State or transfer?
“It’s always tough when you’re deciding to transfer, but it was one of those things where I had to decide,” Foles said. “It had nothing to do with the competition or anything, it just had to do with, did I as a young man — 18, 19 years old — see myself going to college there and being a student-athlete for four years.
“I was a Texas boy, and just wanted to go somewhere where it was a little bit similar to home.”
So he talked it over with his family. He prayed over it. And he eventually sat down with Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio and talked it over.
“I think the world of Coach Dantonio and that staff,” Foles said. “But I had to follow my heart, and it worked out. I went to Arizona, enjoyed being a student-athlete there, found my wife and married.”
But at the time, there were no guarantees in transferring to Arizona.
“My dad told me, ‘If you do this, there’s a chance you’ll never play football again. You just have to know that,’” Foles recalled. “He’s not gonna sugarcoat it; he never has.”
While Cousins was flourishing at Michigan State, Foles did the same at Arizona. Who knows? Had Foles stayed at Michigan State, where he got to know Cousins well, he might never have made it to the NFL. Or vice versa.
“Nick and I were kind of competing, both being freshmen at the time and sharing time on the scout team,” Cousins said on a conference call with St. Louis reporters. “We got to know each other well that year, went to math class together, and spent a lot of time together.
“It’s been really neat to see our football careers and our lives kind of go on paths that have led us to this point. It’s pretty unique.”
How’d the math class go?
“We both did pretty well,” Cousins said, laughing. “We were well prepared for it. Yeah, we did awesome.”
Foles and Cousins have stayed in touch over the years, texting back and forth. Occasionally they’ll run into each other at an event in the offseason.
“We may meet each other, see each other, catch up,” Cousins said. “Our wives met this past offseason, so that’s kind of the way the NFL works, is you’re all in it together and you’re going through similar experiences just in different places. Certainly as quarterbacks you have that shared experience and you both kind of understand what it takes and what you’ve gone through.”
Last Sept. 21, they ran into each other for the first time on a football field.
Foles completed 27 of 41 passes for 325 yards, three touchdowns, and a season-high passer rating of 114.4. Cousins completed 30 of 48 passes for a career-high 427 yards, with three TDs, one interception, and a 103.4 passer rating.
In a shootout, Foles’ Philadelphia Eagles defeated Cousins’ visiting Washington Redskins, 37-34.
Now, almost a year to the day later, they meet again, only this time Foles is wearing a different jersey. After an emotional 34-31 overtime victory against Seattle, Foles’ Rams are trying to start a season 2-0 for the first time since the 2001 Super Bowl campaign of the Greatest Show on Turf group.
But Foles isn’t basking in the afterglow of the Seattle victory. Nor is he thinking about the magnitude of the Rams starting a season with two victories. He’s certainly not thinking about Cousins and Michigan State, circa 2007.
“All we’re thinking about is the Redskins, and going out and executing,” he said. “It’s one game at a time, one play at a time. That’s the mentality you have to have as a competitor. I know that we as athletes say it all of the time, but it’s the way you’re successful.
“If you overlook anything or you get too excited about something, usually it doesn’t go well.”
Things may not have gone well in East Lansing; Foles very much wants them to go well Sunday at FedEx Field.
