Cox started at Independence High School in Charlotte, North Carolina. Cox was named to the 2004 Parade MagazineAll-America Team and Super Prep All-Mid Atlantic Team. He was the North CarolinaGatorade Player of the Year. Cox was on the AP first-team All-State team and was a two-time Charlotte Observer Offensive Player of the Year. He also played in the Shrine Bowl of the Carolinas and impressed scouts by going 31-0 as a starting quarterback. Cox was a two-time team captain and was the number 7 rated quarterback in the country by Rivals.com and Tom Lemming of ESPN. He set a North Carolina record with 66 touchdown passes while taking his team to its fifth consecutive state championship his senior year. Cox was named the MVP of the state title game twice. As a junior, Cox threw for nearly 4,000 yards and over 40 touchdowns. As a senior, he completed 240 out of 363 passes for over 4,500 yards and only five interceptions.
College career
2005–2008
Cox was redshirted his freshman year in 2005. Through the first four years of his career at the University of Georgia, Cox had scattered playing time and completed 33 out of 58 pass attempts for 432 yards with five touchdowns and one interception. As a redshirt freshman in 2006, with Georgia trailing Colorado 0-13 at home late in the third quarter, Cox was put in the game to relieve ineffective starter Matthew Stafford. Cox threw for 153 yards and two touchdowns late in the game to lead Georgia to a comeback win, 14–13. Cox would start one more game in the season, in a 14-9 victory over Ole Miss, but eventually lost his starting job to the highly touted Stafford, who ended up being the first overall pick in the 2009 NFL Draft.
2009
While Cox threw for over 1,200 yards and 11 touchdowns and boasted a 146.4 quarterback rating in his first four games of the 2009 season, he did not perform as well in the next few games. Georgia finished 8-5 on the season with Cox as the starter. In Georgia's 52-41 win over Arkansas in Fayetteville, Cox threw for a career-high 375 yards and matched a school record with five touchdown passes. Against #1-ranked Florida, Cox completed 11-of-20 pass attempts for two touchdowns, which was as many as the Gators had allowed all season, but also threw three interceptions in the 17-41 loss. In his final game at Sanford Stadium, the Bulldogs had a 14-point half-time lead. However, Cox threw two interceptions in the fourth quarter. Along with a red-zone fumble, these interceptions sealed a loss against Kentucky, Georgia's first home loss to the Wildcats since 1977. However, Cox was not asked to do much in the final regular season game against #7-ranked Georgia Tech. With Bulldog tailbacks Caleb King and Washaun Ealey combining for 349 rushing yards, Cox managed the game well, completing 8-of-14 passes for just 76 yards and a touchdown in Georgia's 30-24 victory.
