When asked about quarterback Jalen Kitna, UAB coach and Super Bowl XXXV champion quarterback Trent Dilfer told reporters to circle back to this quote all season.

“I was the sixth pick of the NFL draft in 1994. I was projected to be the first pick at the time. I was one of the higher-rated quarterbacks that had ever been evaluated,” he said. “I was not very good, but I was very talented.

“Jalen Kitna is better than me at every level of football. At this stage of our career, there is not one thing that I was better at than Jalen Kitna is.”

The UAB signal caller is set to open the 2025 season as the Blazers’ full-time quarterback after starting the final eight games last season. In 2024, he finished with a 62% completion percentage as he racked up 2,209 passing yards and 17 touchdowns while throwing 11 interceptions.

As Dilfer noted, the peaks and valleys were plentiful for Kitna during Year 1 in Birmingham following his dismissal from Florida.

In his fourth start, he racked up a monster 404 yards and a school-record six touchdowns in the air en route to a 59-21 rout of Tulsa. But, it was preceded by a pair of two-interception games against UConn and Memphis; the Blazers lost both matchups.

But, one thing stayed the same about Kitna in Dilfer’s eyes: he stayed consistent no matter the stat sheet.

“He came off an injury that set him back a little bit, and then it just became clear that he was the best quarterback on our team,” he said. “When we made the move, we knew there were going to be some growing pains, because he hadn’t played a lot of football, and he played kind of like we expected him to. His highs were extremely high and his lows were extremely low.

“But, what gave us tremendous confidence through the process going into this year was that he never changed.”

The UAB quarterback is the son of longtime NFL player Jon Kitna, who won NFL Comeback Player of the Year in 2003 as the Cincinnati Bengals’ quarterback and played in the NFL at the same time as Dilfer.

Jon is now a head football coach at Lakota East High School in Ohio.

Dilfer, who is friends with Jon, remembers taking caution in the addition of his son when it came to earning an opportunity.

“You could tell in about three hours that he was the most talented person in the building,” Dilfer said of the UAB quarterback. “It didn’t take long to realize. I didn’t even know how talented Jalen was when he went to Florida. I was so busy at Lipscomb and so busy doing that and dealing with my own quarterbacks that I had forgotten how talented Jalen was.

“To see him and be around him, you realize that you truly have a unique talent. But, he hadn’t played a lot of football, and I didn’t want to throw him in there, and I didn’t want it to be a ‘Well Trent’s biased, so he’s going to play his buddy’s kid’ thing, and I didn’t want daddy ball stuff to come up, so Jalen had to earn it.”

Besides Kitna, the only returning starter on offense for UAB is offensive lineman and Huffman High alum JonDarius Morgan.

Among the offensive transfer additions for the Blazers are former Iowa wide receiver Kaleb Brown, former FIU tight end Antonio Ferguson and former UTEP running back Jevon Jackson, a native of Decatur.

Dilfer said the mission for their quarterback is to not just help him meet expectations, but to bring players around him to help him thrive in the offensive system this year.

UAB will open the season on Thursday, Aug. 28, against Alabama State. Kickoff is set for 7:30 p.m. at Protective Stadium in Birmingham.

“When you’re given a unique talent, there’s a burden on the coach to not dumb it down too much; we have a responsibility to not just win games, but to get him ready to go have a 15 to 20 year career in the NFL,” Dilfer said. “We take that very seriously, and we demand a lot from him in that process. Like last year, he has not flinched in that process.”