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We all should have seen this coming, Taysom Hill being named BYU's starting quarterback.

Wait, we all did.

I wrote a column two months ago proclaiming Hill the starter, after he said he was 100 percent healthy. And it was no special insight on my part. Every insider I talked to at BYU's football media day in June, except for Kalani Sitake and Ty Detmer, said they believed the fifth-year senior would be the man. The coaches joined in on Tuesday, when, on Hill's 26th birthday, he officially regained the job that once was his and that the fates had stolen away.

When that word was given, two images of Hill came to mind.

The first was his performance at Texas in 2014, a 41-7 showing that humiliated the Longhorns, an embarrassment that was even worse than the one Hill administered to Texas in Provo in 2013, and that's saying a whole lot. I cannot forget the look on Longhorn faces that September day in Austin. It was a collective confused expression, total exasperation, as the home team could find no answer for Hill. The players had only questions, the fans complaints.

Hill threw past the Longhorns and ran over them, quite literally, including the famous hurdle over a Texas defensive back at the 10-yard line and into the end zone on a 30-yard scamper by the BYU quarterback. On that play, Hill picked his way through the defense near the line of scrimmage, then jetted left down the field, up and over DB Dylan Haines, and across the goal line. It was a remarkably athletic play.

At that moment, Darrell K. Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium fell silent, at least 95,000 of the patrons there did. It was kind of eerie. In that huge building, the burnt orange were frozen. The only noise emanated from a few thousand jubilant BYU fans and echoed across the silence. It seemed as though the folks in blue were the only ones there, and you could hear every one of them, individually. I think even Bevo turned away in absolute disgust, considering that he had just seen utter BS.

"A leap of faith," is what Hill called his run.

The quarterback would need more of that on account of the second image.

It came in front of another 90,000 fans at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln in the first half of the first game of last season against Nebraska. Actually, the real lasting image came a couple of hours later.

You know what happened.

But the way Hill played prior to suffering his Lisfranc injury, and even while suffering it, portended great things to come, great things that did not come. He scored on the play, a 21-yard run that was briefly interrupted by the explosion of his foot when he planted and cut before getting to the end zone. Some of the hurt was subsequently washed away when Tanner Mangum came off the bench to hurl his Hail Mary to Mitch Mathews to win the game, the first home-opening loss for Nebraska in 29 years.

While his teammates ran around the field, celebrating like madmen, Mathews standing and exulting on the spot where he caught the 42-yard game-winner, Terenn Houk hugging the side judge, fans jumping up and down, Hill stood in the middle of the commotion, a boot on his foot, a tight grin on his face. Happy for his teammates, somewhere deep inside him, he had to be aching, hurting more than ever. He knew his season was done, and maybe his football career.

That's what came to mind on Tuesday. Not the technical aspects of what Hill brings that Mangum doesn't, not what it means for the rest of the team, not what it means for Mangum. Just what it means to a quarterback who was done and then wasn't done.

"We're excited to see him go again," Detmer said.

"It's great," Hill said.

It was official, then. Hill, an athlete with so much potential and promise, three times had a season end with injury, and now he has one more shot at playing a game only a fool would play under these circumstances — if he didn't love it.

He does.

And that's pretty cool.

GORDON MONSON hosts "The Big Show" with Spence Checketts weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone. Twitter: @GordonMonson.