Waupun High School junior Jordan Kohout added another distinction to his already impressive list of football honors.
Last season, Kohout was the Eastern Wisconsin Conference Defensive Lineman of the Year. He was first-team all conference on offense and defense, an all-region selection of the state coaches association and even made one all-state team.
But Kohout's biggest honor may be in becoming the first Waupun player for the University of Wisconsin when he joins the team in the fall of 2009. Kohout said he verbally accepted a scholarship recently to play at Wisconsin. Since then, he's been both walking on air and continuing to push himself in his workouts.
"I'm ecstatic,"
Kohout said. "I'm just getting over the shock right now."
Kohout said he committed to new defensive line coach Charlie Partridge, who just joined the Wisconsin staff in February after having spent the past five seasons as the University of Pittsburgh defensive line and specialists coach.
When he and his parents were in Madison for "Junior Day,"
he not only got a chance to meet with Partridge, but also with head coach Bret Bielema, Kohout said.
"After a little meeting I had with the position coach, I got to stay around and went to his office and we got to talk for a little bit and he said they had a full scholarship for me,"
Kohout said.
Waupun coach Rick Applin said that Kohout had been getting plenty of mail from all the Big Ten schools, was talking with Illinois and was talking more seriously with Iowa.
"I liked Iowa a lot because they were showing me a lot of interest,"
Kohout said. "It was always my feeling that if Wisconsin offered, I'd go there because it's close to home and a great school and it's always been my dream to be a part of something like that."
So, when the Badgers offered, Applin said it only took the Kohouts a short time to decide Madison was the place for Jordan's college career.
"It's kind of exciting to have a kid that's got interest from schools like that,"
Applin said.
Kohout went to the Badgers camp for high school players last June, he said. Just about every school holds a camp and it is there that their coaches get to see players in person who they may have only seen on tape up to that point. The coaches make assessments, looking for strength and quickness and, of course, speed.
Kohout, who played last fall at 6-foot-4, 250-pounds, said he ran a 4.99-second 40-yard dash last spring and he said most recently he ran a 4.8.
Kohout said he's gained about 15 pounds since football season ended, which would put him at 265. That's still light for a defensive lineman in the Big Ten, but he's only a junior and players almost always make substantial weight gains once they get on campus and begin workouts under the direction of a college strength and conditioning coach.
"I asked Coach Partridge that at the Junior Day and there's not a set thing, but on average they like to have their defensive tackles at 280 or 290,"
Kohout said.
Kohout said if the Wisconsin staff has shown enough confidence in him to offer him a scholarship, then he's got enough to go on to believe he'll do well.
Applin said Kohout is the type who will do everything asked of him, if not more.
"He's been that way since we've had him at the high school,"
Applin said. "He's religious about going to the weight room and getting workouts in. And he does extra stuff with his dad as far as speed and agility work."
And Applin said that kind of work ethic has resulted in Kohout reaching, and even exceeding goals.
"He set some goals,"
Applin said. "One of them was to play Division I football, namely at Wisconsin, so it's kind of nice a kid's got goals like that and knows how to go about reaching them. You see so many kids who sit back and think it's going to fall in their lap, but Jordan kind of went after it pretty well."
