Jeffrey Godfrey IV (born January 1, 1992) is a former

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wi ...

Slotback Slotback, sometimes referred to as an A-back or slot receiver, is a position in gridiron football. The "slot" is the area between the last offensive lineman on either side of the center and the wide receiver on that side. A player who lines up ...

. Godfrey played for the

University of Central Florida The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university whose main campus is in unincorporated Orange County, Florida. UCF also has nine smaller regional campuses throughout central Florida. It is part of the State University ...

Knights. He led the Knights to the Conference USA Championship in his freshman year (2010), becoming the first true freshman quarterback to win an FBS conference championship game. Following his sophomore year, Godfrey transitioned to the wide receiver position.

Early life

Godfrey was born to Jeffrey Godfrey, Jr., and Roshanda Spencer in

Miami, Florida Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

on November 1, 1990. Godfrey attended high school at

Miami Central High School Miami Central Senior High School is a secondary school located at 1781 NW 95th Street in West Little River, Miami-Dade County, Florida, United States.0.1% 80.7% of students were eligible for free or reduced lunch. Miami Central has a large Hait ...

, located in

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. He graduated as the leading passer in Miami-Dade County history with 7,251 yards, beating the previous record set by Jacory Harris of Miami Northwestern. In high school, Godfrey was rated as one of the top quarterbacks in Florida, and amongst the nation's top 10 dual-threat quarterbacks. Due to his performance, Godfrey has been called "Mr. Dade Football". During his senior year, he committed to UCF. He chose the Knights over

Florida State Florida State University (FSU) is a public university, public research university in Tallahassee, Florida. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida. Founded in 1851, it is located on the oldest continuous site of higher e ...

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Tennessee Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...

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, USF and FIU.

College career

2010

Jeff Godfrey enrolled as a freshman in January 2010, and participated in spring practice. At the start of the season he was second on the depth chart behind starting junior quarterback

Rob Calabrese Rob Calabrese (born March 5, 1990) is an American football coach who is the quarterbacks coach for the New York Jets of the National Football League (NFL). He previously served as an offensive quality control coach for the Denver Broncos. Ear ...

. In his first appearance, Godfrey took over during an opening-game rout of

South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux Native American tribes, who comprise a large porti ...

, going 6-of-7 for 65 passing yards and a touchdown. He would then replace Calabrese the next week while UCF was losing to

NC State North Carolina State University (NC State) is a public land-grant research university in Raleigh, North Carolina. Founded in 1887 and part of the University of North Carolina system, it is the largest university in the Carolinas. The university ...

. He stepped in with 5:17 to go in the third quarter, the Knights down 28–7, and led UCF on two touchdown drives to pull within one score. A fumble by one of his receivers on the third drive ended their comeback hopes with a 28–21 loss. Godfrey went 7-of-10 for 107 yards, and rushed for 53 yards, scoring both touchdowns himself. Godfrey became the starting quarterback in the third game of the season against Buffalo, but with the understanding that he would still be splitting time with Rob Calabrese. Head coach George O'Leary felt it was important for Godfrey to watch a more experienced quarterback work as well before giving him full control of the offense. Godfrey ended up 15-of-24 with 130 passing yards, and rushed for 44 more yards. Initially, Godfrey allowed the Knights' rushing offense to do the heavy lifting while he continued to develop his passing attack as a true freshman. During a game against UAB, Godfrey took a hard hit, forcing Calabrese to step in for the remainder of the drive. Godfrey would return and finish the game. During UCF's game against Marshall on October 13, Calabrese was brought in to run a "Wild Knight" play, UCF's take on the

Wildcat formation Wildcat formation describes a formation for the offense in football in which the ball is snapped not to the quarterback but directly to a player of another position lined up at the quarterback position. (In most systems, this is a running back, b ...

. He scored a touchdown, but tore his ACL in the process, firmly establishing Godfrey as starter for the remainder of the season. When UCF hosted

Rice Rice is the seed of the grass species '' Oryza sativa'' (Asian rice) or less commonly ''Oryza glaberrima'' (African rice). The name wild rice is usually used for species of the genera '' Zizania'' and '' Porteresia'', both wild and domesticat ...

on October 23, Godfrey threw his first touchdown pass since the opener, and finished 13-of-18 for 178 yards. From there he would take full control of the UCF offense, scoring two passing touchdowns in each of the next five games, while only throwing 2 interceptions the rest of the way. His signature game as a freshman would come against

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 i ...

on November 5, where he would go 15-of-19 for 294 yards with two passing touchdowns, and rush for 105 yards–his first 100-yard rushing game at UCF–with one touchdown. As a starter, Godfrey went 8–2 in the regular season placing UCF in both the

AP Poll The Associated Press poll (AP poll) provides weekly rankings of the top 25 NCAA teams in one of three Division I college sports: football, men's basketball and women's basketball. The rankings are compiled by polling 62 sportswriters and broad ...

and USA Today Poll for the very first time in the program's history. He also led the Knights to the Conference USA title against SMU earning them an invitation to the 52nd Annual AutoZone Liberty Bowl, A clash between the Georgia Bulldogs (SEC) and the

UCF Knights The UCF Knights are the athletic teams that represent the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Florida. The Knights participate in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA) Division I ( FBS for football) as a member of the Am ...

(C-USA) with a final score of 10–6 UCF's first ever bowl win. He finished the season completing 159-of-238 passes for 2,159 yards with 13 TDs and 6 INTs, and rushed for 556 yards and 10 more touchdowns. All those numbers are second-most for a true-freshman starter in UCF history behind

Daunte Culpepper Daunte Rachard Culpepper (born January 28, 1977) is a former American football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons, primarily with the Minnesota Vikings. He played college football at UCF and was selected ...

. His 105-yard rushing game against Houston was the highest rushing total for any quarterback; he had surpassed Culpepper's record earlier in the season. Godfrey exceeded a 200

passer rating Passer rating (also known as passing efficiency in college football) is a measure of the performance of passers, primarily quarterbacks, in gridiron football. There are two formulas currently in use: one used by both the National Football Leag ...

four times, and only went under 100 twice. He ended up winning the Conference USA Freshman of the Year award.

2011

Before the 2011 season, Godfrey was placed on the watch list for the

Davey O'Brien National Quarterback Award The Davey O'Brien Award, officially the Davey O'Brien National Quarterback Award, named after Davey O'Brien, is presented annually to the collegiate American football player judged by the Davey O'Brien Foundation to be the best of all National C ...

, which is given to the nation's best quarterback. After leading the Knights to a 5–7 record in 2011, Godfrey requested his release from the team, which was granted by Head Coach George O'Leary. Godfrey was allowed to rejoin the team in April 2012, though he switched positions to become a wide receiver.

Statistics

Professional career

In 2018, Godfrey signed with the

Orlando Apollos The Orlando Apollos were a professional American football franchise based in Orlando, Florida, and one of the eight members of the Alliance of American Football (AAF), which began play in February 2019. The team played its home games at Spectru ...

of the

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for the 2019 season. He was waived/injured before the start of the 2019 regular season and subsequently placed on injured reserve after clearing waivers. He was waived from injured reserve on March 26, 2019.

References

External links

UCF Knights bio

Stats Page
on

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). Th ...

.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Godfrey, Jeff 1992 births Living people American football quarterbacks American football wide receivers UCF Knights football players Miami Central Senior High School alumni Players of American football from Miami Orlando Apollos players