There’s plenty of buzz surrounding Syracuse football for 2024, especially on the offensive side of the ball. The debut of Ohio State transfer Kyle McCord as signal caller should electrify the JMA Wireless Dome in Week One against Ohio. McCord has a lot of weapons to choose from, but he’s going to be one shorter than SU fans expected.
Yesterday, Fran Brown said to the media at the ‘Cuse Coaches Caravan event in Rochester that redshirt junior wide receiver Donovan Brown will not be returning to the program. Donovan Brown will play college football this year at Lackawanna College, a junior college in Scranton, Pennsylvania.
Donovan Brown is coming off a tale of two halves in his 2023 campaign. The first six games saw Brown explode for 298 yards on 22 catches. After that, the receiver was held to just 23 yards for the remainder of the season. The most notable highlight of Brown’s 2023 was an 86-yard touchdown catch in Week 2 against Western Michigan.
This announcement comes after Donovan Brown was absent from team activities during spring camp and missed the annual spring game. After the game, head coach Fran Brown said that Donovan was not currently with the program and had “some things he has to take care of between himself and the university.”
Despite not playing for the Orange in 2024, Fran Brown says that a return for Donovan is not out of the question.
“We hope that things can go well,” Brown said. “I wish the best for the kid. Seems like we’d be able to get him back, but Donovan Brown’s a great kid, great athlete. Done a lot of stuff. He actually matured a lot from the time when I first got here to when he ended up not being (able to participate) in spring. Kid did a really good job. Really happy for him. Excited about his future at junior college ‘cause I think he’s gonna go and kill it. We’ll just see if we’re lucky enough to be able to have the chance to let him come back here.”
So McCord will be missing a weapon for 2024, but there’s still a lot of depth in SU’s receiver room. Donovan Brown’s absence may be missed the most on special teams, where he was slated to return kicks like he had last year. Either way, losing a receiver isn’t the best scenario for Fran Brown in his inaugural season as head coach.
