MONTGOMERY | The spotlight will be even brighter on Jarrett Stidham this fall.

The junior returns after throwing for the second-most yards in Auburn history as one of the top quarterbacks in college football and one of the top prospects for the 2019 NFL Draft.

USA Today included Stidham among its top 10 players for the 2019 draft and NFL.com’s Chad Reuter listed Stidham 14th in his ranking of the top 150 college football players for 2018.

How will Stidham handle all the extra attention? Gus Malzahn, for one, doesn’t expect it to be a distraction.

“Jarrett is a very focused young man,” Malzahn said. “There were high expectations last year with everything. I know he'll do everything in his power to help us take that next step as a program.

“There's nothing better than experience in our league, and he had a full year under his belt. He played against the best defenses in college football and played well. I think he's in a good spot. He's going to be very driven, and he's a team-first guy anyway.”

Stidham was limited during spring drills to rest his non-throwing shoulder following offseason surgery. But any movement restrictions will be lifted after the players return to school next week for the start of summer semester.

“When we come back he’ll be turned loose to do everything,” Malzahn said. “I know he’s really looking forward to that. He could’ve done a little bit more the last week of spring, we just didn’t want to take any chances. We wanted to be cautious with that, but he’ll be back ready to go when we come back.”

Malzahn praised Stidham for his toughness after playing through the injury for much of last season.

“During the season he didn’t complain about it, took some licks on it, and obviously the bowl game, that’s when it really started to bother him,” Malzahn said. “He’s a tough guy, he’s a leader. We really expect big things out of his leadership this year.”

That leadership will be important this summer, especially when captain’s practices begin in July and it’s up to the team’s veteran players to lead their position groups through drills.

“You got to have your leaders in the summer,” Malzahn said. “He’s one of our team leaders. For him to be able to do everything, I think is very big. The coaches can only be with them two hours a week with football-related things. The rest of the time it’s your leaders.

“The fact that he’s got a year under his belt, he’s one of our team leaders, and to be ready in the summer, I think that’s going to be really big for us.”

Summer semester begins May 17. Auburn opens the season Sept. 1 against Washington in Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium.