On Rhett Lashlee's first day as SMU head coach, Nov. 29, 2021, he Googled who he had committed in the Mustangs' recruiting class.
Previous coach Sonny Dykes had taken basically the entire staff with him across town to TCU, and Lashlee had to completely rebuild, especially the recruiting staff. The major recruiting websites informed him SMU didn't have a quarterback commit in its class. That needed to change.
A few days later, Lashlee went up to Frisco to watch South Oak Cliff, a rising inner-city Dallas high school program, face Lovejoy in the Texas high school playoffs. Lashlee needed to reconnect with programs and coaches around the Dallas-Fort Worth area after two years at Miami, and he needed to scout players. South Oak Cliff had several Division I prospects, so that game made sense. Lashlee and offensive coordinator Casey Woods checked out a receiver, a cornerback, a linebacker. But a less-heralded player kept impressing them.
"It was evident their quarterback was different," Lashlee said. "I looked at Casey and said, 'What am I missing on this kid?' You kept watching him. He wasn't playing athlete. He was playing quarterback, hitting his back foot, ball out on time."
Kevin Jennings was committed to Missouri State, his only Division I scholarship offer. SOC beat Lovejoy 42-20, and Jennings threw for 250 yards with three total touchdowns.
After the game, SOC offensive coordinator Jacoby Walker says, a Missouri State coach in attendance walked up to him and said, "Kev played awesome, but I think he played too good."
Jennings wouldn't stay committed to Missouri State for long.
Three years later, he is the most underrated player in the country, so sayeth Nick Saban. Actor Timothée Chalamet recently started the 2025 Heisman push for Jennings on ESPN's "College GameDay".
A week after that performance against Lovejoy, SMU offered and Jennings committed. Then he led SOC to Dallas ISD's first state championship since 1958. Last year, Jennings won SMU's first conference championship in four decades in his first career start. Now he's taken the Mustangs to the College Football Playoff, where they'll take on Penn State on Saturday afternoon. It's been a lot, but those close to him say nothing's changed.
"He is as confident as a young man as I've ever met," Lashlee said. "At the same time, he's incredibly humble, like he doesn't walk around acting like it, but he knows it, and his teammates know it."
Jennings arrived at SMU in 2022 as a raw talent. He played in four games but redshirted. He backed up Preston Stone in 2023, but when Stone suffered a season-ending leg injury in the regular season finale, Jennings stepped in and stepped up. He threw 33 passes in the AAC championship against Tulane, nearly as many as he'd thrown in his SMU career to that point, leading the Mustangs to a title and their 11th win, second-most in school history.
At that point, other schools started reaching out and asking Jennings to transfer. With Stone coming back, Jennings seemed unlikely to start at SMU.
"He had an opportunity to go somewhere else, have a guaranteed starting position and make more money," SMU athletic director Rick Hart said.
But Jennings stayed. SMU was one of the few places that trusted him coming out of SOC. He reciprocated that.
"I trusted in the coaching staff and my brothers," he said. "I didn't want to let them down. I wanted to ball out with them. I trusted the staff and their ability to shape me into a great player."
It was also no secret that SMU coaches loved Jennings' upside. Even with Stone returning off a strong 2023 season, the staff had to figure out how to use Jennings' abilities. The quarterback competition was open. Stone won the starting job in fall camp, but Jennings would play.
A sign of the difficulty of the decision: Both Stone and Jennings were voted by their teammates to be among the six team captains.
"We believed in both of them," Lashlee said. "You could see Kevin's natural God-given ability and knew his ceiling was crazy high, and it was just a matter of, we've got two good ones, let's let them play it out. That way, we're not deciding. Competition will decide it."
The Mustangs nearly stumbled out of the gate, ending any CFP hopes before they even started, trailing Nevada 24-13 heading to the fourth quarter of their Week 0 opener thanks to a bevy of self-inflicted mistakes. The Mustangs rallied to win, but the quarterback situation remained unresolved. Stone threw an interception on his first pass and Jennings led the first touchdown drive, but Stone played most of the game.
When Stone struggled out of the gate against BYU in the third game, he was benched for Jennings. SMU lost 18-15 and Jennings' numbers weren't great, but they were one finished drive away from winning the game, reaching the red zone five times without scoring a touchdown.
A week later, Jennings completed 14 of 19 passes with two touchdowns in a blowout win over TCU, and the Mustangs were off and running, winning nine consecutive games to reach the ACC Championship Game.
"My first impression was how raw he was," said tight end Matt Hibner, who transferred in from Michigan this year. "As we progressed in the season, his ability to read defenses and stay composed in high-pressure situations has only gotten better. He's become a complete player."
There were a couple of bumps along the way. Against Duke, Jennings threw three interceptions and fumbled the ball away twice. He also broke a finger. SMU escaped with a win, and a week later, Jennings completed 17 of 25 passes for 306 yards and two touchdowns in a blowout win against Pitt, the best game of his career.
"That showed you his competitive character and the makeup he had," Lashlee said. "For him to bounce back the next week with a broken finger nobody knew about, nobody would've had any clue."
Turnovers popped up again in the ACC title game against Clemson, as Jennings had an early fumble and interception, but he recovered to throw for 304 yards and score four total touchdowns, leading SMU back from a 17-point deficit only to have Clemson escape on a field goal as time expired.
Now Jennings leads SMU into the Playoff. He has already confirmed he's coming back to the Mustangs for his fourth season. The ceiling is incredibly high. Saban and Chalamet both see it.
"He's electric, man," said safety Isaiah Nwokobia.
Jennings is still quiet in public. Teammates say the personality comes out the more you get to know him. At SOC, recruiters thought he was a product of the talent around him. SMU coaches saw more. Now it's on display for the rest of the world.
"When he plays, you can feel that edge he has," Lashlee said. "It just showed what we already knew, honestly, and none of us have been shocked by him."