Last winter, receiver A.J. Jenkins didn’t expect to see anything from Illini quarterback Nathan Scheelhaase this season.

He didn’t know the freshman, and he had spent the early part of the spring working to build chemistry with Jacob Charest, the incumbent starter.

“He’s surprised me a lot. Last year, he was on the scout team, and I really didn’t think nothing of him,” Jenkins said.

“Obviously, before the season, everybody thought Jacob Charest was going to be the starter. Nathan Scheelhaase has come into the competition, and he’s starting. He obviously surprised me.”

Scheelhaase has surprised a lot of people this season, and surprised excited fans even more last Saturday against Purdue when the redshirt freshman completed 16 of 20 passes for 195 yards and four touchdowns along with 118 rushing yards.

He could have had two more passing touchdowns, but receiver Spencer Harris and tight end Evan Wilson were stopped at the 1-yard line.

All this came a few weeks after Scheelhaase hit a low-point.

In a 26-6 loss to Michigan State, the Illini quarterback threw three interceptions and no touchdowns on 15-for-27 passing.

Offensive coordinator Paul Petrino said the confidence the freshman showed in preseason and early on just wasn’t there.

“Me and (quarterbacks) coach (Jeff) Brohm even went up to him in practice and said, ‘Hey, remember what won you the job.’ He had a couple of weeks where he was so worried about getting everything exactly right, being what he expected,” Petrino said.

“Go out there and have that fire and have that enthusiasm and be the leader and be the guy that won the job.”

Scheelhaase said he never got down on himself.

It’s this level-headedness that he said kept him from getting too comfortable after last weekend’s performance, which won him the award for Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week.

“My mom said a great thing a few weeks ago,” Scheelhaase said.

“You never let your highs get too high and you never let your lows get too low. I think that’s always got to be. Before the season, when you’re hearing all of this negative stuff, you don’t let your lows get too low, you don’t worry about that stuff. When you do start to have success, you don’t let your highs get high and pay attention to that.”

It’s that mentality that has kept Scheelhaase from changing after becoming a Big Ten starting quarterback.

The always-humble quarterback said he gets noticed all the time around campus and in classes, but he remains shy as ever.

He still walks around with his headphones on and sits in the front corner of his class every day.

“I just feel like I’m the same me that I was when I got here and showed up on campus,” he said.

“Obviously people from the outside view me as a different person but nothing really has changed me and that’s something that’s always been important to me, to stay true to myself.”

For Jenkins, the surprises from the quarterback started early, and he has no doubt that they’re going to keep coming.

“Even in that first game against Missouri, he was so calm. He wasn’t worried about all that outside talk. He was calm and came into the huddle and just kind of took control of the huddle,” Jenkins said.

“I mean, he’s definitely grown up. It’s going to be scary to see what he’s doing in the next two, three years here.”