Tyler Graunke came to the University of Hawai'i to replace a record-setting quarterback.

Funny thing is he thought it was going to be Tim Chang, not Colt Brennan.

So, if Brennan announces the intention to leave early for the NFL draft at today's press conference, as many expect, it won't be like the opportunity to step in and lead the Warriors is something that just snuck up on Graunke.

In Graunke's mind, and with his fiercely competitive makeup, he's been the air apparent to the nation's No. 1 passing offense all along. There's just been, as the airlines like to put it, a "slight delay" in the implementation. He's been the future of the Warriors, if only it would just get here.

When Graunke signed with UH in 2004, fresh from setting the state high school single-season passing yardage record in Arizona, he was the apple of head coach June Jones' eye. The feeling was he'd take the controls when Chang, who was a senior, departed. It was why Graunke redshirted while watching Chang polish off the NCAA career passing yardage mark. And why he stayed around as Brennan put down roots and set marks.

Graunke showed up amidst UH's most hyped quarterback class, a group that included Brandon Satcher, the South Carolina player of the year, and Taylor Humphrey, the San Francisco Chronicle Bay Area quarterback of the year. Then he beat out or outlasted a seven-man field.

And then, just when Graunke appeared to have the inside track, guess who showed up for fall camp 2005 out of the blue? A double transfer from the University of Colorado and Saddleback (Calif.) Community College, Brennan came off the bench in the season opener against Southern California and soon took over at Michigan State.

Graunke, while completing 74 percent of his passes in 2006, has been waiting, preparing and waiting some more ever since.

Curiously, Graunke hadn't initially planned or particularly wanted to be anybody's QB. Instead of throwing the ball, Graunke wanted to catch it — or lay a licking on those who did. Growing up in Tucson, Ariz., Graunke played wide receiver and safety in Pop Warner and through the early part of his high school years.

Only when Salpointe High's varsity quarterback was injured and the junior varsity starter was moved up did anybody bother to take a look at Graunke at the position as a junior. "The coach asked for people who could throw the ball and, having played baseball all my life, I could throw," Graunke said. And, throw he did, passing for 3,372 yards and 38 touchdowns as a senior, his only season as a starter.

If Brennan announces his departure today, nobody will have to tell Graunke about what the opportunity means. Not after he's been waiting three years, to the limits of his patience, for its knock.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.