Hutson Mason is a patient man of faith.

In today's world of instant gratification and the everything-has-to-be-done-yesterday mentality, it's not the normal trait you would expect to find in an 18-year-old, let alone Lassiter High School's most recognizable athlete.

Mason's patience is an invaluable asset when he takes the field at quarterback.

So far this season, he has led the Trojans to a 7-0 record, thrown for 2,377 yards and connected with his receivers for 26 touchdowns. Mason has completed 76 percent of his passes, thrown only three interceptions in 209 attempts and, last week, his 545 passing yards set a new Georgia high school state record.

But for all his patience letting him be successful on the field, it is Mason's faith off the field that is most impressive, and something he is leaning on as he juggles football, his academics, his rightful change from being a teenager into a man and what is becoming a more stressful and mind-boggling recruiting process.

"My faith is a huge part of who I am," Mason said.

Mason comes from what he calls a "very religious family." He is a member of the First Baptist Church in Woodstock and offers his teammates and other friends and classmates from Lassiter a chance to meet with him and others in a weekly bible study, as he did Tuesday night.

In those meetings, Mason said it is an opportunity for fellowship, a chance to talk about personal issues and a chance to listen and learn from an occasional guest speaker. But on Tuesday, it was Mason who did the talking, and he talked about his patience and how he is able to stay calm when a big decision on his future and where he will go to college will soon need to be made.

"(The recruiting process) was one of the big reasons I talked about that (Tuesday)," he said.

For good reason.

For someone with such gaudy numbers - who threw for 3,705 yards as a junior, was Class AAAAA's Offensive Player of the Year and is a mere four months from National Signing Day - Mason has offers from only four Football Bowl Subdivision schools: Eastern Michigan, Western Michigan, UAB and Indiana, none of which ring through with any big-time football tradition.

Originally, Iowa offered Mason a scholarship, which he came very close to accepting, but the Hawkeyes got an in-state quarterback to commit and pulled Mason's offer from the table just before he made the decision.

Despite the disappointment, just like he stands in the huddle, Mason remains cool and calm.

But it begs the question.

Why are the scholarship offers so slow to present themselves?

To this point, no college coach has told him of any significant drawbacks in his game.

Lassiter coach Chip Lindsey said its not that bigger schools aren't looking at Mason, it's just that he is consistently the third or fourth quarterback on their recruiting board.

Is it his size?

Not at a solid 6-foot-3.

Is it a lack of arm strength?

While it's true in looking at many of the Lassiter games on DVD, Mason cannot be found throwing a deep out pass. But, any question of arm strength should have been answered last week against Milton. While rolling left, Mason squared his hips and shoulders and threw a pass across his body 50 yards down the middle of the field for a long gain.

Eliminating size and arm strength, it leaves other facts. One, Mason is never under center. He takes every snap from the shotgun, and no one is going to mistake him for Usain Bolt anytime soon. It seems as if many college coaches see Mason as nothing more than a system quarterback.

But even to those coaches, 545 yards passing is hard to ignore, and it may have opened a few others eyes.

Since Saturday, Mason said he has heard from coaches at Mississippi State, Arkansas, Georgia Tech and Tennessee. And, truth be told, in a perfect world Mason would like to wear orange, run through the "T" and out onto Neyland Stadium as a Volunteer.

"If I could go anywhere, it would be to Tennessee," he said. "My uncle went there, my old quarterback coach (Tee Martin) went there, and that's where I'd want to go. Saturday, when they called again, they invited me up for another visit and said they would like to sit down and talk 1-on-1."

Mason's favorite piece of scripture from the Bible comes from Mark 11:24 and reads:

"Therefore I say unto you, what thing soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them."

Or, in layman's terms, as it says on Mason's Facebook page: "So, I tell you to believe that you have received the things you ask for in prayer, and God will give them to you."

It sounds like the old adage may be true - "Patience is a virtue." - and for Mason, at least until he signs his name on a National Letter of Intent in February, he's just going to keep on keeping the faith.

sportseditor@mdjonline.com