Quarterback Max Duggan had a strong final season at TCU, helping the program reach the national championship game.
But that final collegiate contest could not have gone worse for Duggan and the Horned Frogs, as they lost to Georgia 65-7.
Duggan finished that game 14-of-22 passing for 152 yards with two interceptions and a rushing touchdown. He was sacked five times, which brought his rushing yardage total to -38.
That kind of loss when playing for hardware is inherently tough to move past. But Duggan said at the Combine on Friday that he’s doing his best to learn from the experience.
“I don’t know if I’ll ever get over it,” Duggan said. “That’ll probably burn for a while on a game like that, in the biggest stage, and it doesn’t turn out the way we want to. But I think there’s just a lot that I’m still learning from it — how to come back from adversity, how to mentally just get over a hump like that. To almost erase it, where you don’t want to let it dictate too much, but understand that there’s things I can get better at from that game.
“So, still a learning process right now.”
To be sure, that one game doesn’t negate all the good Duggan put on film in four years at TCU — particularly in 2022. In 15 games as a senior, Duggan completed 63.7 percent of his passes for 3,698 yards with 32 touchdowns and eight interceptions. He also rushed for 423 yards and nine touchdowns.
Duggan finished second in Heisman Trophy voting to USC’s Caleb Williams.