Police escorts to US college stadiums and booked-out hotels are the new normal for Jake Stoeckel.<\/p>\n
The 22-year-old has moved from Renmark in South Australia’s Riverland to Kent, Ohio for at least three years to play American football as a punter for the Kent State Golden Flashes.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jake Stoeckel grew up in Renmark, in the South Australian Riverland region. (Supplied: Rachael Stoeckel)<\/p>\n
August was a whirlwind of change for Stoeckel, who spent 25 hours travelling before arriving in Kent in the early hours of August 1.<\/p>\n
“By 6:30am, I was at the practice facility ready to go, and was there until 9pm \u2026 pretty much did that for the first week straight before we had half a day off,” he said.<\/p>\n
“It’s been quite an experience so far \u2014 I’m enjoying every minute of it.”Taking the punt on American football<\/p>\n
Stoeckel was well known in the Riverland sporting scene, notably in Australian Rules football for the Renmark Rovers, and tennis.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jake Stoeckel was Renmark Rovers’ U15 best and fairest and leading goal kicker with 31 goals in 2017. (Supplied: Rachael Stoeckel)<\/p>\n
His interest in American football was piqued during work experience with the Essendon Football Club about two years ago.<\/p>\n
“I was talking to [former Australian Rules footballer] Dustin Fletcher \u2014 both his boys are over here doing it and one of them is in Ohio as well,” Stoeckel said.<\/p>\n
“I spoke to him about it and then kind of came out and gave it a shot myself.”<\/p>\n
Stoeckel trained with Prokick Australia in Melbourne and said he had been “working towards coming to college from that moment”.<\/p>\n
According to the Melbourne Sports Law Association, Australians make up about 46 per cent of punters in college football teams.<\/p>\n
There are five Australian-raised punters in the NFL currently \u2014 Mitch Wishnowsky, Michael Dickson, Tory Taylor, Cameron Johnston and Matthew Hayball.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jake Stoeckel played his first game as a college football punter on August 30. (Supplied: Milan McMichael, Kent State Athletics)<\/p>\n
Prokick owner and head coach Nathan Chapman said AFL skills were transferable and it was becoming more common for Australians to travel to the US for college football.<\/p>\n
“We get so many more enquiries now because the [sporting] coverage is very good,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I think it’s opened their eyes to know that it’s a legitimate pathway, you can get educated from it and get a college degree paid for, and you can experience playing big-time football.”<\/p>\n
Mr Chapman said Stoeckel was a consistent player who had worked hard on his craft.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Nathan Chapman spent a pre- and off-season with the Green Bay Packers in 2004 before returning to Australia. (Supplied: Nathan Chapman)<\/p>\n
“He has a really natural kick of the football [and] has some great skills,” he said.<\/p>\n
“He turned up to training, he did all his work \u2026 it was just a matter of time for him to get his opportunity.<\/p>\n
“To watch to his first kick was pretty special.”<\/p>\n
Growing into a sports star<\/p>\n
Stoeckel’s first game for the Golden Flashes on August 30 resulted in a 21-17 win against Merrimack College.<\/p>\n
It was the team’s first win since 2023 after a 21-game losing streak.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jake Stoeckel says the following college football has in the United States is insane. (Supplied: Milan McMichael, Kent State Athletics)<\/p>\n
“That was my first time on the field \u2026 actually being out there and having some pretty big boys running at you is quite intimidating,” Stoeckel said.<\/p>\n
“A lot of them are like 6’5″ [1.95 metres], 110kg and move faster than I ever could.”<\/p>\n
The fanfare for college football was palpable during Stoeckel’s trip to Dix Stadium before the game.<\/p>\n
“We had a police escort to the stadium,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Just the scale of where you end up and how big it is across the country is insane.”<\/p>\n
His most recent game included a trip to Texas, where he said a hotel had been “completely booked out” for the team.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Jake and Rachael Stoeckel at the airport before Jake left for Kent, Ohio. (Supplied: Rachael Stoeckel)<\/p>\n
Mum Rachael Stoeckel said she raised her two sons, Jake and Nate, to do something they were passionate about.<\/p>\n
“Jake’s always had above-average gross motor, even as a little person, and sport just was a really big focus for him,” she said.<\/p>\n
“He’d excel in whatever sport he was in, but American football was not something I thought he would end up doing.<\/p>\n
“To see him out there, I’m the proudest mum in the Riverland at the minute.”<\/p>\n
Jake Stoeckel grew up playing tennis and Australian football in the Riverland. (Supplied: Grant Schwartzkopff)<\/p>\n
A piece of home<\/p>\n
The family will fly to Ohio in the October school holidays to visit Stoeckel and watch him play.<\/p>\n
Until then, Stoeckel has a little piece of home with him after the team added stickers of the Australian flag and the Renmark postcode to his helmet.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
An Australian flag sticker has been added to Jake Stoeckel’s Golden Flashes football helmet. (Supplied: Rachael Stoeckel)<\/p>\n
“That was awesome, I didn’t actually know they were doing that,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I’ve told Cliff our equipment guy I’m going to make sure he gets some Australian treats like some Tim Tams \u2026 so he’s looking forward to it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Police escorts to US college stadiums and booked-out hotels are the new normal for Jake Stoeckel. The 22-year-old…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[6177,1607,399,87414,17905,35602,87417,87416,398,396,397,6454,87415,87418,99],"class_list":["post-140423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-american-football","tag-college-football","tag-football","tag-jake-stoeckel","tag-kent","tag-kent-state-golden-flashes","tag-kent-state-university","tag-nathan-chapman","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-ohio","tag-prokick-australia","tag-punter","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140423\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}