{"id":109005,"date":"2020-01-09T13:53:01","date_gmt":"2020-01-09T23:53:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=109005"},"modified":"2020-01-09T13:53:01","modified_gmt":"2020-01-09T23:53:01","slug":"mcdonald-nfl-draft-announcement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2020\/01\/09\/mcdonald-nfl-draft-announcement\/","title":{"rendered":"UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa quarterback forgoes senior year for NFL<\/abbr> draft"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> < 1<\/span> minute<\/span><\/span>
\"quarterback
Cole McDonald makes a pass at an away game.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> at M\u0101noa<\/a> quarterback has made the decision to forgo his senior year and enter the 2020 NFL<\/abbr> draft.<\/p>\n

Junior Cole McDonald<\/strong> announced on January 8 in an Instagram post<\/a> that he will be pursuing his dreams of playing for the NFL<\/abbr> after having discussions with his family and coaches. The La Mirada, California native has played as a Rainbow Warrior since 2016. He redshirted in his freshman year to hone his skills as a quarterback.<\/p>\n

\"Cole
Cole McDonald<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

McDonald has notable achievements on the UH<\/abbr> M\u0101noa team, such as a Mountain West honorable mention and offensive player of the week<\/a>, and 40 touchdowns—the fifth most in UH<\/abbr> single-season history.<\/p>\n

He appreciates his time in Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> and expressed his gratitude for everyone on the Rainbow Warrior team, as well as his friends and family.<\/p>\n

“I will forever be grateful to the University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> for being the only school to offer me the chance to play Division I<\/abbr> football,” said McDonald, via Instagram. “I will always carry Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> on my arm, but more importantly, Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> will always be in my heart.”<\/p>\n

After his announcement, the UH<\/abbr> coaches gave McDonald their well-wishes via Twitter.<\/p>\n

“Thank you for your dedication, hard work, memories and setting the standard!” said quarterback coach Craig Stutzmann<\/strong><\/a>. “Stay focused, stay relaxed, but most importantly have fun! Good luck China.”<\/p>\n

China was a nickname given to McDonald by the UH<\/abbr> team.<\/p>\n

View McDonald\u2019s full statement on his Instagram post.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Junior Cole McDonald announced on social media that he has declared for the 2020 NFL<\/abbr> draft in pursuit of his professional athlete dreams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1362],"tags":[58,83,714,9,550],"class_list":["post-109005","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-athletics","tag-athletics","tag-football","tag-student-athlete","tag-uh-manoa","tag-manoa-athletics","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109005","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109005"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109005\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109086,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109005\/revisions\/109086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109005"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109005"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109005"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}