Jayden Maiava to be first Polynesian starting quarterback at USC

Before he’d ever played the position, Jayden Maiava had a sense of what a Samoan quarterback could mean to his community. Growing up in Oahu’s Palolo Valley in a big Samoan family, he’d felt that power firsthand. Like so many other boys his age on the islands, he watched Marcus Mariota at Oregon and Tua Tagovailoa at Alabama with a sense of awe and wonder. He watched as the whole of Hawaii seemed to galvanize around them and boys emulated them, promising their friends they would be the next Marcus or Tua someday.

Maiava, at the time, had never been so bold as to envision a similar path for himself. Playing football had always been a foregone conclusion, but he’d never really considered playing quarterback. In his own family, where football roots ran generations deep, no one had ever tried the position. Most had settled along the defensive or offensive fronts, where Polynesian prospects were so often penciled in. Plus, Maiava was a quiet kid — not the type you’d first expect to welcome the pressure of the position.

But one day, soon after his family moved from Hawaii to Las Vegas, his new youth football team was in need of a quarterback. Uriah Moenoa, a former Hawaii offensive lineman who Maiava calls uncle, was helping coach the team. Moenoa expected, with his size and athleticism, that the seventh grader would gravitate to defense. Until someone asked if anyone could throw, and Maiava raised his hand.

“He’s been a quarterback pretty much ever since,” Moenoa says.

Now that shy Samoan boy who watched Marcus and Tua captivate the Samoan community is poised to step into a place of similar cultural significance. When he takes the field Saturday against Nebraska, he’ll become the first passer of Polynesian descent to start a game at quarterback for USC.

The weight of that history — at a school known both for its wellspring of quarterbacks and lineage of Polynesian stars — hasn’t been lost on Maiava, who called it “a blessing and a privilege.” The fact that he’ll duel with Nebraska freshman Dylan Raiola, another quarterback of Polynesian descent, only adds to the special moment.

“It’s big shoes for me to fill,” Maiava said. “But I think, with the great team we have, the great players, great coaches we have, it takes a lot off. It makes my job easier.”

Consider the rest that’s at stake Saturday, with USC’s hopes of bowl eligibility hanging by a thread, and you might wonder if that weight would be too much to shoulder for a young quarterback still finding his way. But teammates and coaches say they’ve seen Maiava step seamlessly into that spotlight since being named the starter during USC’s bye last week.

“He’s been way more confident,” said wideout Makai Lemon.

“He’s been putting his heart out there,” added offensive lineman Emmanuel Pregnon.

That certainly seemed to be the case last Tuesday as Maiava strolled into a crowd of reporters with a newfound air of confidence, just 24 hours after he’d been named the starter. This quarterback was not the same one that had mumbled through his first meeting with the media months earlier. It was as if, suddenly, he’d found his voice.

“How’s everybody doing?” Maiava said for all to hear, smiling as he approached. “Why’s everybody so quiet?”

The irony of that moment was not lost on Moenoa, who’d known Maiava since he was born. He’d been on four-hour car rides to Las Vegas with Maiava where he barely spoke a word.

That was how Moenoa had always known Maiava to be as one of eight siblings on the island. Hed’ always been quiet – and quick to defer to others around him.

“In Samoan culture, you never talk out of turn,” Moenoa said. “You never overtalk. You never boast. You just do your thing.”

But football had a way of bringing Maiava out of his shell. Quiet as he was off the field, Maiava had never shied away from contact on it. He was big and physical at a young age, but he was less sure quarterback was the right fit.

“At first, I didn’t want to play the position,” Maiava said this week. “I didn’t think I had what it took to play the position, honestly. But [family members] really pushed me and told me I could do it. As long as I put my mind to it, the rest would take care of itself.”

It wouldn’t be long before he started to believe. Maiava recalls one particular game against national power Bishop Gorman during his freshman year at Sierra Vista High as the moment it dawned on him that he could hang at quarterback.

Moenoa never doubted Maiava had the tools. Anyone could see that just looking at him. But that one season at Sierra Vista, he watched Maiava assert himself in a way he never had before.

“As a freshman, he took command of the team,” Moenoa said. “He had a lot of seniors on that O-line, but he really took command and everyone listened. As an uncle, I was proud watching him.”

Maiava would never get long to set his feet as a quarterback after that. He bounced between three high schools in two states before taking the reins as a freshman at Nevada Las Vegas last season. When he transferred to USC this past January, he stepped into a locker room that already had an entrenched leader at quarterback in Miller Moss.

Maiava was slow, at first, to warm up.

“He was new,” running back Woody Marks said, “so he really didn’t feel ready to open up.”

But that would come in time. By last Monday, when Lincoln Riley called him into his office to tell him he was the new starter, his teammates had already come to count on his steady demeanor.

“He’s just a guy who puts his head down and works every day,” wideout Kyle Ford said. “He’s not really worried about the end outcome all the time. He’s worried about the process and how he can get better every day, and I think that’s what he’s done to put himself in position.”

Stepping in as the starting quarterback, Maiava knew that he would have to be more vocal. But it wasn’t in his nature to announce himself as such, either.

“It’s just a matter of being present for them, letting me know I’m here for them,” Maiava said. “I’ve got my teammates’ back.”

For now, that’s all he’s worried about. He has tried to set aside the significance of Saturday, training his focus instead on his preparation.

“I know he’s hearing it, and he’s feeling it,” Moenoa said. “The message is still the same. Do what you need to do. Drown out the noise, focus on the task at hand.”

But for those who have watched his progress firsthand, it’s hard not to imagine what it would mean for a Samoan quarterback to become a star at USC.

Maybe, safety Akili Arnold wondered, he would even inspire other Polynesian football players to “not shy away from being that guy.”

“Now that Jayden is the first one at USC,” Arnold said, “it opens a lot of eyes for us.”