Stanford Names Davis Warren Starting QB vs. Hawaii

The announcement was expected throughout training camp, and on Tuesday Stanford head coach Tavita Pritchard made it official — transfer Davis Warren will be starting the opener for the Cardinal against Hawaii on August 29. Warren comes to The Farm via the transfer portal from Michigan, where he was the Wolverines' starting QB in 2024 after the program won the national championship in 2023. He beat Alex Orji for the starting quarterback job that season and went on to throw for 1,199 yards with seven touchdowns in nine games. He also threw nine interceptions. Warren tore his ACL in Michigan's 2024 ReliaQuest Bowl win over Alabama and had to miss the entirety of the 2025 season due to injury.  During his junior year at Loyola High School in Los Angeles, Warren was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML). He underwent four rounds of chemotherapy, and his body responded positively, ruling out the need for a bone marrow transplant. He would end up reclassifying to the Class of 2021, playing his final season of high school football at the Peddie School in New Jersey. From there, he was brought to Michigan by former Stanford head coach Jim Harbaugh, earning a spot as a walk-on.  While other quarterbacks were mentioned as possibilities, the way Pritchard had talked about Warren as a leader that the players gravitate toward and listed his desired QB attributes made the choice clear.  It wasn't just how his head coach talked about him, but also the fact that he was one of three players that traveled for the ACC Media Kickoff last month. It would have been a weird move to include him in all of those media sessions if he was going to be sitting on the bench all season.  "The things that stick out to me about Davis are that he absolutely loves football," Pritchard said after disclosing Warren would be the starter. "He loves preparing. Like, he loves watching film. He loves kind of diving into different situational aspects of the position." Pritchard added that this level of love for the game resonates with him because, as a former quarterback, he shares that same passion. "I'm a nerd [about football]. I'm a geek. I love it," Pritchard said. "When you have players in that space with you, it's energizing." One of the reasons Warren was tabbed as the starting quarterback is because of his ability to affect others, which was on full display in a recent clip that was posted by the ACC digital team, in which the Stanford QB spoke glowingly of Nico Brown, whom he has yet to play a game with. Building relationships with new players and the wide receivers he'll often be throwing to is critical. With the improvements made to the offensive line and Warren's own abilities within the pocket, the Cardinal program will be in a good position to surprise some teams.