Junior quarterback Teddy Bridgewater and Louisville should blow out FIU on Saturday, but you'll have to forgive Bridgewater if he is hoping the Golden Panthers' quarterback has a solid game.
Coming off a 21-point loss to FCS foe Bethune-Cookman, a game in which starter Jake Medlock suffered a concussion, FIU is expected to start backup quarterback E.J. Hilliard, a sophomore.
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Bridgewater and Hilliard are good friends. Hilliard backed up Bridgewater when both attended Northwestern High in Miami.
"It's going to be a little fun looking over and seeing him on the other side," Hilliard told the Miami Herald on Tuesday.
Hilliard and Bridgewater work out together when Bridgewater goes home to Miami during the offseason, and they share a nickname: "Gump," as in movie character Forrest Gump. In August, Bridgewater told the Louisville Courier-Journal that Hilliard was a fan of the movie: "All of his jokes were related to the movie "Forrest Gump," so everyone would call him 'Gump.' "
The quarterbacks embraced the nickname and started calling each other "Gump." They decided it would be an acronym for "Great Under Major Pressure."
There's another FIU-Louisville quarterback connection: FIU's third-string quarterback is true freshman Travis Wright, a Louisville native. His favorite receiver in high school was James Quick, a true freshman at Louisville who had 85 catches as a high school senior.
Mike Huguenin can be reached at mike.huguenin@nfl.com. You also can follow him on Twitter @MikeHuguenin.
