National : Wolfert leaves pool to pursue kicking dream
It was the first kickoff of Jeff Wolfert’s career. The then-high-school senior lined up alongside his teammates, hoping to blast the ball toward the back of the end zone. After situating himself, he trotted toward the ball, garnered all his strength, and swung his leg into the ball. To this day, Missouri’s senior kicker vividly remembers what transpired next.
‘I was just trying to kick the heck out of the ball,’ Wolfert said. ‘So that’s what I did. I kicked it real hard, and suddenly felt a pop and a snap in my hip. And what happened was some muscle tore a piece of bone off my hip as I was kicking through the ball.’
Just like that, after only one kick attempt, Wolfert broke his hip and missed the rest of his senior season in high school. Wolfert, an accomplished diver in high school, recovered in time to continue his diving career at Missouri.
But Wolfert couldn’t stay away from the football field, and he took another shot at kicking with the Tigers. He has since developed into one of the nation’s top kickers. He has yet to miss a field goal or extra point attempt in Big 12 competition, going a perfect 90-of-90 overall (26-of-26 FGs, 64-of-64 PATs). After three years, Wolfert has missed only seven kicks, and connected on 184-of-191 field goals and extra points combined.
Wolfert grew up participating in soccer and competitive diving, but football always interested him. During middle school, he was quarterback of the football team.
As time elapsed, all his classmates physically got bigger and stronger, while he remained the same size. So Wolfert dropped football to pursue his interests in soccer and diving.
During high school, he developed into an accomplished diver, receiving national attention from numerous collegiate scouts. Despite his overwhelming success in the pool, Wolfert felt compelled to return to football as a senior, relying on his soccer skills to earn a roster spot.
‘During my senior year, I grew a lot and got a lot stronger, so I wanted to play football again,’ Wolfert said. ‘I played soccer since kindergarten and I always did corner kicks, free kicks, and penalty kicks since I had a really accurate and strong leg. So I decided to go out for kicker and then I got the starting job.’
But Wolfert’s return to football was short-lived. After one disastrous kickoff attempt, his season ended, and he watched the rest of the team’s games from the sidelines.
Wolfert still received a scholarship offer from Missouri as a diver. But he never lost his desire to play football. During the spring semester of his freshman year, Wolfert constantly harassed the coaching staff, pleading for an opportunity to win a walk-on spot as a kicker.
After rejecting Wolfert’s previous requests, Tigers quarterbacks and kicking coach David Yost finally gave him a private workout.
First, Yost tested Wolfert’s trajectory by challenging him to kick the ball over the crossbar from five yards behind the uprights. After the exercise, Yost worked him on extra points and gradually moved his kicking position 10 yards back. Throughout the drills, Wolfert effortlessly nailed each field goal attempt.
As a means to challenge him, Yost placed a 10-foot-tall net about five yards in front of his kicks. Even with the hindrance, Wolfert booted a 50-yard field goal during the workout. Once the workout ended, Yost realized the Missouri diver was a special kicking talent.
‘He was probably the first guy I’d ever worked out that when he kicked the ball, it went dead straight.’ Yost said. ‘It didn’t have any turn to it or lean, which most guys have, especially right-foot kickers. But he had really good leg strength and the height on his kicks was really good.’
After earning a walk-on spot, Wolfert found himself in a quandary. He was eligible to participate in both diving and football, but recognized he couldn’t balance both schedules. Tigers diving coach Brian Hoffer wanted Wolfert to be solely committed to one sport. If he chose football, Wolfert would lose his diving scholarship. Wolfert wouldn’t receive financial compensation if he chose to kick as a walk-on on the football team.
In the end, Wolfert decided to fill the void created by his high-school injury.
‘For me (playing football) was a dream unexplored,’ Wolfert said. ‘In the sports world, football is a lot bigger than diving. I wanted to do something big, but barely anyone knows about diving. But if you play football, all of a sudden everyone in the university knows you.’
In order to prepare for the 2006 season, the now-senior Wolfert traveled to the National Elite Camp, a summer camp for college kickers, punters and long snappers, to fine-tune his kicking skills, specifically kickoffs.
At the camp, he convened with kicking counselor Jamie Kohl, and he worked with him about three to four times that summer. During each session, Kohl analyzed Wolfert’s mechanics and slightly tweaked his kicking delivery.
‘We tried to shorten his jab step a little bit on his field goals,’ Kohl said. ‘We tried to get him a little closer on his plant foot, and we changed some of the distances on his approach, so he could feel more comfortable.’
Now, the coaching staff has the utmost confidence in Wolfort’s abilities once they enter field goal range. The former diver has come a long way from that catastrophic kickoff in high school.
‘He’s really progressed into a weapo,’ Yost said. ‘Anytime we get close to that 30-yard line, we’re saying, ‘Hey, we know we are coming away with points.”
Game to Watch: No. 23 Oregon at No. 9 Southern California
It will be interesting to see how the Trojans rebound from its shocking loss last Thursday against Oregon State. Most analysts projected the team to contend for a national title, but as things stand now, it might not even qualify for the championship game.
This weekend, USC head coach Pete Carroll seeks to avenge last year’s heartbreaking loss to the Ducks. In that game, former Oregon quarterback Dennis Dixon and running back Jonathan Stewart led the team to a 24-17 victory over the Trojans. Over the past dozen meetings, both teams have evenly split the series, 6-6.
