Colt Brennan tossed just one touchdown last week in an injury-abbreviated performance against Utah State following a five-interception showing at Idaho.

Time to throw in the towel on Hawai'i quarterback's fading Heisman Trophy candidacy?

Not necessarily. Not yet, anyway.

With Friday's national cable game at San Jose State comes a last-chance opportunity to begin leaping back into consideration. And that's what it's going to take: a leap. Nothing he hasn't done before. Just something he hasn't done while throwing off a sometimes unstable right ankle.

If Brennan can remain healthy enough to pick apart defenses again — and begin doing it in bang-up fashion for the straight away — he might yet revive the fast-fading hopes of getting to New York in December as a finalist.

Significant "ifs" to be sure given the tenderness of his right ankle, the opportunities for reaggravating it and the inviting target it poses for opponents.

But midway through a season in which no one has yet roared out in front in the Heisman derby, who is to say he couldn't get hot enough to become a contender? Surely nobody who has seen him pick apart Fresno State, Arizona State or Purdue.

And some would even tell you his chances of winning the statue haven't been totally extinguished, either. "I think he's got a great opportunity the second half of the year here to enhance his candidacy and, I think, he is still a viable candidate to not only get to New York but to win the thing," said ESPN's Sean McDonough, who will do play-by-play of the San Jose State game.

"I don't think anybody is way ahead of anybody else right now," McDonough said.

That might be the biggest thing Brennan has going for him, a still wide-open race. Usually by this time the sweepstakes have narrowed to a consensus leader or small pack. Not this year.

Now comes a potential opening for Brennan, whose Warriors have four cable dates in their six remaining regular season games.

"I don't think many people are going to be overwhelmed by what you do against Northern Colorado or Charleston Southern but you start doing it against Fresno State or Boise State or Washington and that's an entirely different thing," McDonough said. "I think (being healthy and putting up big numbers for a winning team) is going to be the key. It looks like one of those nagging injuries that is probably going to affect him the rest of the year, but that's the nature of football, too. Not too many guys playing college football six or seven games don't have something bothering them."

UH coach June Jones has been telling anyone who will listen that to truly appreciate Brennan's gifts you have to see him up close. "I'm looking forward to seeing him in person," McDonough said.

The hope is Brennan can make seeing is believing while there still might be time.

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