Miami » As he surveyed the field being painted for Sunday's Super Bowl XLIV, while surrounded by interviewers in the seats of Sun Life Stadium, Austin Collie remembered being perplexed when NFL teams were drafting one receiver after another and nobody was calling him.

"To say that you're not wondering why, I'd be lying," Collie said Tuesday, "but I really wasn't concerned about that as much as ending up in the right situation."

Which is to say in Indianapolis and, eventually, the Super Bowl.

It is a big story in this NFL postseason, how Collie could be drafted in the fourth round behind 18 other collegiate receivers in April, yet catch more passes (counting playoff games) than any of them as a rookie. Having skipped his BYU senior season, Collie became the most productive NFL receiver to come from a Cougar program known for its passing game.

"From the moment I got that call, I knew it was going to be a good fit," said Collie, who caught a touchdown pass in each of the Colts' two playoff wins. "That was the moment I knew that it was the right decision to come out, and it was the right opportunity."

In Indianapolis, accompanied by a football-savvy wife who quizzed him on the Colts' thick playbook in the evenings after practice, Collie found an offensive system, a future Hall of Fame quarterback and a position that suited him, and he seized his opportunity after a starter's injury.

Collie's BYU quarterbacks, John Beck and Max Hall, were effective passers who loved to study football; the Colts' Peyton Manning takes those qualities to another level. Asked who's the bigger perfectionist, himself or Manning, Collie said, "I would say Peyton, for obvious reasons. He's Peyton Manning."

Collie also "has the kind of personality where he is going to work on something until he gets it right," said Colts head coach Jim Caldwell.

Collie demonstrated that trait as early as the second grade. Upset with himself for coloring outside the lines of a drawing, he asked the teacher to go to the office and make him another copy. "I'll watch the kids," Collie promised.

When he arrived at BYU from the Sacramento area in 2004, Collie immediately was disappointed not to be practicing with the first string. "This is week one," marveled Beck, telling the story.

Such confidence "makes Austin who Austin is," Beck said. "He's good at what he does, and he knows it. He also knows you have to constantly work at it."

Collie won the Mountain West Conference's freshman of the year award, then served a two-year LDS Church mission to Argentina. His sophomore season is remembered both for his catch on a fourth-and-18 play that triggered the Cougars' rally to beat Utah and for an interview afterward, when he spoke of being rewarded for doing "what's right" on and off the field.

Teammates valued him for keeping them loose before games by quoting lines from "The Office" and conducting mock interviews during warm-ups. They also welcomed his passionate halftime speech during an '08 game at Air Force. "It's what the team needed, someone to step up and say what everyone was thinking," Andrew George said.

Dependable, efficient receivers have thrived in Provo, if not in the NFL. Two good examples stood in Collie's wedding reception line: His father, Scott, and father-in-law, Kirk Pendleton, were BYU teammates in the early 1980s. The receivers reunited in 2007 at a BYU practice (Pendleton's son, Jordan, is a Cougar linebacker), leading to Austin Collie's marrying Brooke Pendleton.

Naturally, the couple's fathers have discussed what NFL teams traditionally overlook. They believe the BYU-style receiver with a knack for getting open and catching the ball is undervalued in a league that emphasizes speed.

In the first quarter of the Colts' first game, though, Anthony Gonzalez injured his knee and was lost for the season. Collie took it from there.

"He's very blessed to be in the situation he's in," said Beck, now a Baltimore Ravens quarterback. "If Anthony Gonzalez doesn't get hurt, who knows? Things kind of have to work out for you."

They certainly have for Collie in his rookie season. And with the potential genes of a Super Bowl receiver for a father and two other BYU receivers as grandfathers, the pass-catching Collies may keep coming to the NFL.

"Hopefully," Collie said, "they're on the PGA Tour."

For him, the Super Bowl will have to do.

kkragthorpe@sltrib.com