Notre Dame QB Everett Golson Leaves University

Notre Dame starting QB Everett Golson will leave the university, reportedly due to an academic violation.

As a redshirt freshman in 2012, Golson led Notre Dame to an undefeated season and a trip to the BCS championship game, but now has left the Fighting Irish.

“Everett is not enrolled at the university. Federal law and our own polices preclude us from discussing specifics,” spokesman Dennis Brown said in an email.

The Notre Dame QB leaves because of an academic violation, the Chicago Tribune reported, citing two sources.

Golson started 11 games for Notre Dame last season, completing 187-of-318 passes for 2,405 yards and 12 touchdowns with six interceptions. He was also effective with his legs, rushing for 298 yards and six touchdowns.

After such an unexpected success in 2012, the Fighting Irish suddenly have a big question mark at quarterback. The Notre Dame QB leaves a team that already struggled on offense, and has no clear successor at signal caller.

The job could fall to senior Tommy Rees, who saw spot duty this season as Golson worked through early struggles. But Golson appeared more comfortable with the playbook as the season wore on, and finished with something of a historic season. He joined Joe Theismann (1970) and Jarious Jackson (1999) as the only quarterbacks in Notre Dame history to pass for more than 2,000 yards and rush for more than 300 in a season.

Fourth-year junior Andrew Hendrix and spring enrollee Malik Zaire are also on the depth chart, but Notre Dame have already lost another promising quarterback. Shortly after the BCS championship game, redshirt quarterback Gunner Kiel announced he was leaving the school.

Kiel later enrolled at Cincinnati.

Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly said he thought Gunner Kiel would have had a good chance to compete for the starting job next season.

“We had kind of created an opportunity for him to compete in the spring,” Kelly said. “So maybe a little surprised from that standpoint, because he was actually told he’d be given the opportunity to compete. Sometimes when you don’t hear that, you wouldn’t be surprised.”

Though the Notre Dame QB leaves for the 2013 season, there is no word on whether he might be able to return to Notre Dame at some point.