You can call him coach Carter now.

For the past four football seasons, Drew Carter has been the starting quarterback for the LaGrange College Panthers.

Beginning this season, though, Carter will have a new role.

Carter, who graduated this spring with a psychology degree, will be the new wide receivers coach at the school, taking over for the departed DeMoreo Ford.

Carter has been thinking about going into coaching for a couple of seasons now, and when the opportunity arose to coach at LaGrange College, he jumped at it.

He went through the interview process along with all the other applicants, and when he was offered the job, "there wasn't much thought to it."

He quickly agreed, becoming the latest member of head coach Todd Mooney's staff.

"It's pretty exciting to be able to come back and coach at your alma matter and be able to contribute in another way besides playing," he said.

Carter contributed plenty during a stellar playing career.

He arrived at LaGrange College in the fall of 2007, just in time for the Panthers' second season of football.

Carter ended up starting 39 games in four seasons, missing two games because of injury.

His best season came in 2008 when, on a team that went 9-2 and made it to the NCAA Division III playoffs, he threw 26 touchdown passes and averaged better than 200 yards a game.

By the time Carter exited the stage, he'd thrown for more than 7,000 yards with 56 touchdowns, setting passing records that future quarterbacks will likely be chasing for a long time.

As much fun as Carter had playing football, he knew the finish line would arrive at some point.

He realized awhile back that he wasn't ready to leave the sport behind, though, so he decided that coaching was his calling.

"I've been throwing it up for several years, but I wasn't sure if that's what I wanted to do," he said. "I'd say toward the end of my sophomore years, I made that decision after I talked with my family and had a lot of thought about it."

Carter knows there'll be a learning curve.

Quarterbacks are often referred to as a "coach on the field," but being an actual coach is still a different proposition.

"It's an adjustment," he said. "I'm taking it each day at a time and I'm working on it."

Carter isn't sure what his long-term coaching goals are.

He's wanted to get his start in college coaching, but he could end up coaching in high school one day.

"I'm not real sure about (my coaching future) yet," Carter said. "I want to do college first. I'll give that my best effort and do the best I can."

One thing Carter said he will do is take a lot of what he's learned from his coaches over the years and apply that to his own career.

"I feel like you learn a lot from coaches if you play as long as I have," he said. "You take a lot from coaches you had through your whole career. You take pieces of them, and you implement that into your plan into being a coach."

As for the LaGrange College coaches Carter said "I've learned a lot from this staff. They've been a big part of it."