Tuesday night, the Nebraska Cornhuskers landed a major quarterback commitment out of the Transfer Portal. Former UNLV Rebels quarterback and 2025 Mountain West Offensive Player of the Year Anthony Colandrea is a Husker. Let’s dive into what this means and what Colandrea brings to Lincoln.
Former UNLV QB Anthony Colandrea Commits to Huskers
What Does the QB Bring to Nebraska?
The junior quarterback began his career with the Virginia Cavaliers, spending two up-and-down seasons there. In his time with the Cavaliers, Colandrea threw for 4,083 yards and 26 touchdowns. However, he struggled with turnovers, throwing 20 total interceptions. After two seasons, Colandrea opted to enter the Transfer Portal and committed to the new Dan Mullen system at UNLV. This gave the quarterback an opportunity to shine, and he sure did. Colandrea finished the 2025 season with 3,4589 yards and 23 touchdowns while completing 65.9% of his passes. The quarterback also settled down with the turnovers, only throwing nine interceptions.
His performance this season led to him being named the 2025 Mountain West Conference Offensive Player of the Year and to the First-Team All-Mountain West team.
Former UNLV Quarterback Anthony Colandrea has committed to Nebraska🌽
PFF’s 10th Highest-Graded QB in 2025 (89.6) pic.twitter.com/hRDUySWnqZ
— PFF College (@PFF_College) January 7, 2026
Adding to all of that, Colandrea is also a pretty mobile quarterback, which will come in handy in Dana Holgorsen’s offense. He rushed 127 times for 649 yards and 10 touchdowns this past season. Outside of running, Colandrea has shown the ability to move throughout the pocket and escape pressure. This is a good thing to add for a developing offensive line that is only going to get better throughout. This was something missing this past season at quarterback. Former star quarterback prospect Dylan Raiola lacked the ability to escape the pocket when needed, and that hurt the Huskers’ offensive performance and led to many sacks. You most likely won’t have that problem with Colandrea.
What Does This Mean?
There was worries of what the Huskers would do at quarterback. Raiola’s entering the Transfer Portal left a sour taste in the mouth as it marked an elongated failure in his time here. The worries ever so increased after former Notre Dame Fighting Irish quarterback Kenny Minchey committed to the program, and then flipped to Kentucky on Monday. Colandrea’s commitment alleviates the pressure the coaching staff probably had when looking at quarterbacks in the Transfer Portal. It also means that there wasn’t just one plan in place when trying to land a quarterback, especially with it happening only one day after Minchey flipped.
Anthony Colandrea > Kenny Minchey 🤷♂️
pic.twitter.com/dMP4f0Uqdz— SleeperCFB (@SleeperCFB) January 6, 2026
So, what does this mean for quarterbacks position room at Nebraska? The expectation is that there will be a quarterback battle this Spring and Fall camp. The Huskers still have freshman TJ Lateef on the roster and performed okay through the final four games after taking over for the injured Raiola. It should be an interesting battle to become QB1 in Lincoln.
Another interesting thing to think about is who Colandrea turned down. The quarterback turned down Mike Norvell and Florida State and had a visit planned for Georgia Tech. Nebraska won itself a recruiting battle, and now the dominoes will continue to fall throughout the rest of the Transfer Portal recruiting, including at potentially running back and receiver. This portal cycle looked to be a disappointment for the Huskers just a day ago. However, after a few key commitments, including Colandrea, it’s looking to be a good class of players, and it will continue to grow.
Main Image: Raymond Carlin III-Imagn Images