Blaze Berlowitz Has Been Named Vanderbilt's Starting QB Over Five-Star Freshman Jared Curtis

When Diego Pavia transferred to Vanderbilt from New Mexico State following the 2023 season, Blaze Berlowitz came with him.

They had played together at New Mexico State, they had built something together and Berlowitz made the same leap that Pavia did, trusting that Vanderbilt was the right place, even knowing he was coming in as the backup.

He was right about Vanderbilt. He was right to wait.

Clark Lea announced Tuesday that Berlowitz will be the Commodores' starting quarterback for the 2026 season, beating out five-star true freshman Jared Curtis in a camp competition that had been genuinely contested all August and that most of the college football world expected to end differently.

Curtis was the No. 4 recruit in the 2026 cycle, the No. 2 quarterback in his class and the most coveted recruit in Vanderbilt history.

When he flipped from Georgia to Vanderbilt late in the recruiting cycle, the assumption, stated plainly by many analysts, was that he would start from the moment he stepped on campus.

Lea had denied that premise with his words all offseason. On Tuesday he denied it with his actions.

Berlowitz is a senior. He is 6-foot-3, over 230 pounds, and has the arm, the frame and the football IQ that SEC competition requires. He appeared in six games last season as Pavia's backup, completing nine of 17 passes for 131 yards and a touchdown. He did not light the world on fire.

He was steady. He showed enough that the coaching staff trusted him with the hardest quarterback job in the country, replacing Diego Pavia, who became one of the most celebrated players in Vanderbilt's modern history.

Berlowitz grew up in Cushing, Oklahoma, population roughly 8,000, and played his high school ball under head coach Rusty Morgan, who himself had been coached by Vanderbilt offensive coordinator Tim Beck at Pittsburg State.

That connection ultimately brought Berlowitz to New Mexico State, and the chain from Cushing to Las Cruces to Nashville is a straight line of trust built across a decade of relationships. He was a three-star prospect coming out of high school. He was not supposed to be here. He is here.

What Fans Can Expect From Blaze Berlowitz

The most honest thing to say about Blaze Berlowitz is that he is not Diego Pavia.

Nobody in college football is Diego Pavia. Pavia was a once-in-a-generation college football story, a junior college player who became a New Mexico State starter who upset Auburn in Jordan-Hare Stadium who transferred to Vanderbilt who then led the Commodores to their best season since 2013, including a victory over then-ranked Alabama.

He became a celebrity in Nashville in a way that genuinely changed Vanderbilt football's recruiting profile. He is the reason Jared Curtis became available to Vanderbilt in the first place.

Berlowitz does not need to be that. He needs to be a capable, efficient SEC quarterback who manages the game, protects the ball and gives Vanderbilt's talented roster, which includes several high-profile transfer pieces accumulated during the program's resurgence, a chance to win.

His completion percentage and decision-making rate as a backup last year suggested he can do those things. The offensive coordinator Tim Beck will not ask him to be a hero every week. He will ask him to execute.

The wild card is Jared Curtis, who Lea confirmed will also see game action in the Week 1 opener against Austin Peay.

That creates a genuine question: is Berlowitz the starter or is this a two-quarterback rotation heading into the regular season, with Curtis seeing reps until one of them clearly separates?

Lea has positioned it as Berlowitz's job with Curtis getting developmental time. How that plays out against Austin Peay on September 5 will tell the real story.

Vanderbilt's schedule this fall is a genuine test of what the program has become, Georgia, Ole Miss, Alabama, Florida and a home game against Tennessee in Week 13.

The Commodores were not supposed to be playing this kind of schedule as a program anyone took seriously. They are. Blaze Berlowitz from Cushing, Oklahoma by way of New Mexico State is the quarterback walking out first.

He waited two years. He has the job now.