Asad Tajmmal Abdul-Khaliq (born August 4, 1980) is an American former professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

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who played for the Chicago Rush and New York Dragons of the

Arena Football League The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 Arena Football League season, 1987 season, making it the third longest-runnin ...

(AFL) and Fort Wayne Fusion of

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. He played

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for the

Minnesota Golden Gophers The Minnesota Golden Gophers (commonly shortened to Gophers) are the college athletics, college sports teams of the University of Minnesota. The university fields a total of 21 (9 men's, 12 women's) teams in both men's and women's sports and com ...

College career

Abdul-Khaliq was a four-year letter winner with Minnesota and was a two-year captain. Abdul-Khaliq started as a freshman in 2000, although he eventually split quarterback duties during his freshman and sophomore years with junior-college transfer Travis Cole, with Cole seeing the majority of playing time. In 2002, after Cole graduated, Abdul-Khaliq became the full-time starter as a junior in 2002 and helped lead the Gophers to an 8–5 record, topped off by a win over Arkansas in the

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. During Abdul-Khaliq's senior season in 2003, the Gophers got off to a 6–0 start and were nationally ranked before suffering a devastating comeback defeat at the hands of the

Michigan Wolverines The Michigan Wolverines comprise 29 varsity sports teams at the University of Michigan. These teams compete in the National Collegiate Athletic Association, NCAA's NCAA Division I, Division I and in the Big Ten Conference in all sports except wo ...

in a nationally televised game at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome. The Gophers finished off the year 10–3, including a 31–30 victory over Oregon in the Sun Bowl. For the season Abdul-Khaliq passed for 2,401 yards, throwing for 17 touchdowns and scoring four more on the ground. Over his entire Gophers career, Abdul-Khaliq completed 481-of-847 career passes for 6,660 yards and 55 touchdowns in 46 games. He added 1,158 yards and 16 touchdowns rushing. Asad set Golden Gopher career records for touchdown passes (55), passing yards (6,600), total offense (7,818 yards), completions (481) and career touchdown-to-interception ratio (2.1-1). As of 2008, he currently holds all those records except for passing yards and completions which were broken by his successor Bryan Cupito, who also tied Abdul-Khaliq's touchdown mark of 55. His 19 touchdown passes in 2002 were one shy of Mike Hohensee’s school record for touchdown passes in a season, and he tied Hohensee's record of 10 straight games with at least one touchdown pass. He was the first quarterback in Gopher history to pass for at least 12 touchdowns in three seasons.

Professional career

Chicago Rush

Abdul-Khaliq signed a three-year contract with the Chicago Rush of the

(AFL) on November 1, 2004. He was Chicago's third-string quarterback during his rookie year in 2005 but did not see any playing time.

New York Dragons

After playing in only two games for the Rush in 2006, Asad was traded to the New York Dragons. He did not start any games for New York in 2007, however he did play a little at defensive back, as the team finished the season 5–11 and failed to make the playoffs.

Fort Wayne Fusion

Abdul-Khaliq signed with the Fort Wayne Fusion of the

af2 The AF2 (often styled as af2, and short for arenafootball2) was the Arena Football League's developmental league; it was founded in 1999 and played its first season in 2000. Like its parent AFL, the AF2 played using the same arena football r ...

in 2007.

Personal life

His cousin, Todd Bowles, was the

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for the

New York Jets The New York Jets are a professional American football team based in the New York metropolitan area. The Jets compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the American Football Conference (AFC) AFC East, East division. The team p ...

from 2015 to 2018 and is currently the head coach of the

Tampa Bay Buccaneers The Tampa Bay Buccaneers (colloquially known as the Bucs) are a professional American football team based in Tampa, Florida. The Buccaneers compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC S ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Abdul-Khaliq, Asad 1980 births Living people Elizabeth High School (New Jersey) alumni Players of American football from Elizabeth, New Jersey American football quarterbacks Minnesota Golden Gophers football players Chicago Rush players New York Dragons players Fort Wayne Fusion players