JT Daniels’ college football story arc has nearly come full circle in a roundabout way.

Four years after he made his Georgia debut in Mississippi State’s last visit to Sanford Stadium, Daniels is back in the state in his first coaching job after a long and winding playing career.

Technically, his title at West Georgia is offensive analyst but he works closely with quarterbacks at the Carrollton school.

“We talk about game plan specific stuff, quarterbacking in general,” Daniels said.

Daniels knows about the twists and turns that can come with the position.

He went from five-star recruit from Irvine, Calif. to freshman starter at Southern Cal in 2018, transferred to Georgia where he made his debut in the seventh game of the 2020 season, lost the starting job to Stetson Bennett, transferred to West Virginia and then again to Rice.

Now he’s at FCS level West Georgia, which is 1-4 after a 20-16 home loss to Austin Peay. The Wolves play Saturday at Central Arkansas.

How former Georgia football player JT Daniels wound up coaching

Daniels medically retired from football due to four concussions after playing nine games last season at Rice.

He went to Senior Bowl week in Mobile last winter to try to get into coaching. He chatted there with Dan Lanning, the former Georgia defensive coordinator and now Oregon coach, and Georgia coach Kirby Smart.

Daniels, 24, joined the West Georgia staff largely because of his ties to offensive coordinator Dane Stevens, who was a Southern Cal graduate assistant when Daniels was there.

Carrollton, population 26,738, is located not far from the Alabama border.

“Everywhere I’ve ever been in Georgia, I’ve really enjoyed it," Daniels said. "I loved living in Georgia when I lived in Athens. I feel very similar about Carrollton.”

Looking back to that 2020 Mississippi State game, Daniels called it “a pretty eventful night. Any time you come off of 13 months of not playing, it feels weird to step in. Every time you take the field, a lot of things can happen to you when you play football. And the last time you literally played against a live defense, you tore an ACL, there’s definitely something in your mind that plays and can bring with it a certain set of emotions.”

Daniels completed 28 of 38 passes for 401 yards and four touchdowns in a 31-24 win.

“Mississippi State kind of sold out to stop the run," he said. "It was lucky I had Todd Monken calling it and George (Pickens), Jermaine (Burton), Kearis (Jackson), Darnell (Washington), a lot of guys in the receiving game that stepped up and played really well.”

No Georgia quarterback had passed for 400 yards in a game since until Sept. 28, when Carson Beck put up 439 in Georgia's 41-34 loss at Alabama.

“When his opportunity came, he took advantage of it,” Monken, the then Georgia offensive coordinator, said of Daniels before the Peach Bowl that season.

JT Daniels savors Georgia football's 'team-first mentality'

Daniels lost the starting job in 2021 while battling an oblique injury and then a sprained lat muscle.

He left Georgia with a 7-0 record as starter and a national championship ring — the program’s first in 41 years — that is in his parents' Dallas home.

“That whole experience was great,” Daniels said. “It’s obviously difficult being a guy that’s pretty constantly dealing with a lot of injuries kind of week in and week out, but being part of the team was great.”

As for that perfect record as a starter, Daniels said: “Someone showed me, I have to be the only Georgia quarterback to never cross the line of scrimmage with the ball in my hands. I have a career rushing long at Georgia of zero yards.”

Daniels said he keeps in touch with several former Georgia teammates including Bennett. He texted Brock Vandagriff after he and Kentucky beat Ole Miss a couple of weeks ago.

“Being a part of a team like that, I think one of the reasons why that team was as successful as it was and why Georgia continues to be so successful is sort of the team-first mentality,” Daniels said. “When you’re on the team, everybody does truly buy into that. There’s a strong next man up mentality that every team talks about but not every team necessarily lives up to it.”

Daniels is getting accustomed to being on a college football staff and determining if he’s in for the long haul.

“There’s a few options,” he said. “I’m also really interested in psychology and also getting my master’s.”

Daniels worked with Trevor Moawad, the late mental conditioning coach, and Drew Brannon, a sports psychologist who has teamed with Georgia in recent seasons. Daniels bachelor’s degree from Georgia is in psychology.

“I’m a huge advocate for performance and psychology in as a field in general and the impact it can play on a person’s life and on team success,” Daniels said. “I watched it happen firsthand at Georgia. Georgia takes a strong approach to the psychology game and it absolutely pays off in a lot of different facets.”

That Mississippi State game, he said, feels “forever ago and yesterday at the same time. It’s interesting. It’s kind of the way it is. I’ve pretty much moved every year since then somewhere else across the country. I’ve been a starter, backup, coach, career ended. As drastic as it may seem, it hasn’t really felt that way for me personally.”

His college career spanned six seasons at four schools. Daniels finished with 9,390 passing yards with 66 touchdowns and 32 interceptions.

“Definitely not what you expected but I wouldn’t take any part of it back for anything,” Daniels said. “I really did love my playing days and my playing career and I’m very excited for whatever comes next.”

This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Back in state, JT Daniels on his UGA football debut vs Mississippi State