Stampeding Through the 2025 USF Football Roster: #95 LS Garrett Cates
I said every notable player and I am a man of my word.
PLAYER: Garrett Cates
POSITION: Long snapper
YEAR: Redshirt senior
HEIGHT/WEIGHT: 6'2", 220 lbs.
HOW DID HE GET HERE? Cates played both long snapper and defensive end at Steinbrenner High School, about a half hour drive from USF. He started his college career out of state at FCS Charleston Southern, where he redshirted as a freshman and then spent two years as the starting long snapper. He returned home and transferred to USF in 2024.
HOW WAS HIS 2024 SEASON? Presumably pretty excellent, though if you want to be sure you should probably check in with Garrett because I am woefully unqualified to evaluate long snappers. At any rate, he won the starting long snapper job and never gave it back, and as far I can remember there were no snap-related issues in the 2024 season. He even notched two tackles on the season, for his troubles.
I kid, but long snapper is a position where you don’t appreciate its importance until you really, really need one. In 2020, the Bulls lost one of their contenders for the long snapper job to a torn ACL in preseason and had to turn to a team videographer to take over midseason (the team couldn’t hold tryouts because of the pandemic - at one point, current Buccaneers linebacker Antonio Grier was the backup snapper). In the Notre Dame game that season, the Bulls had two snaps fly over their punters’ head in a 52-0 loss. 2020 was horrifying.
WHAT SHOULD WE EXPECT IN 2025? Cates is the presumptive starter, but I should note that USF brought in another FCS transfer long snapper this offseason - Turner McLaughlin from Tennessee Tech, who started as a freshman and earned all-conference honors. Could there be a snapper battle brewing this summer? We’ll see, but it’s good to know that USF’s lengthy snaps are in good hands either way.
