While Cam Ward hasn’t decided if he will throw at the NFL combine next week, the quarterback knows how he will answer any scouts or team personnel who ask him if he quit on the Miami Hurricanes team by not finishing his final game with them, Stephen Hawkins of The Associated Press reports.

“Okay, you’re either going to draft me or you’re not,” Ward said Monday night before receiving the Davey O’Brien Award as the nation’s top college quarterback. “If you don’t draft me, that’s your fault. You’ve got to remember you’re the same team that’s got to play me for the rest of my career, and I’ll remember that.”

Ward was showered with online criticism suggesting that he quit on the Hurricanes after he didn’t play the second half of the Pop-Tarts Bowl in December, a 42-41 loss to Iowa State. He broke the NCAA Division I record for career touchdown passes before halftime.

The quarterback, who could be the first player taken in the NFL draft in April, said the decision not to play in the second half of that bowl game was predetermined by he and the entire coaching staff.

“I just think we all got what we needed out of it. They seen things that they think they need to work on ... for this season coming up. And they also knew, you know, what I had on the line,” Ward said. “We feel like we’re doing what’s best for the program and myself. I mean, it was a hard decision, especially when, you know, some guys on our team didn’t play who I thought should have played. It was also, you know, those guys thought about their future the same way I thought about mine.”

Miami coach Mario Cristobal has defended Ward, and last month called the accusations of him quitting on the team “a false narrative.”

“If I could do it again, I’d do it the same way,” Ward said Monday, though he later added, “I wish we could have ended up winning the game. If we had won the game, they wouldn’t have said nothing. And so that’s usually how it goes. And, you know, you just got to take it on the chin and just keep pushing.”

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