Alonso Rojas

As it happens, Alonso Rojas’ foray into the realm of kicking/punting came about by accident.

A freshman on his high school team six years ago, Rojas was working as a linebacker when it came to light that the team was a kicker/punter short of a football team. It later came to light that Rojas had grown up a soccer player, and after he was promptly repositioned, the result was that – for the next four years – Miami’s Killian High School did not have to worry about its kicking game.

“Ever since then,” says Rojas, who went on to become rated the country’s best prep punter by Scout.com, “I’ve just … focused on kicking and punting.”

Indeed. As a new member of the 14th-ranked Kansas University football team, the sophomore transfer is slated to handle kickoff duties for the Jayhawks while also taking over for four-year starter Kyle Tucker at punter.

What’s more, with the recent thinning at the place-kicker position – red-shirt freshman Stephen Hoge transferred from the program last week and sophomore Jacob Branstetter could miss the ’08 season due to eligibility issues – Rojas now finds himself thrust into the mix at that position, as well.

On the team’s most recent depth chart, released Monday, Rojas is listed alongside Grady Fowler – the only other kicker listed on the team’s roster – as a potential replacement to former standout Scott Webb. And during his weekly meeting with the media Tuesday afternoon, Jayhawks coach Mark Mangino – who only recently began having Rojas participate intensively in kicking drills – said he’s been impressed with the early returns Rojas has provided at the position.

“If we had Alonso take every rep from the beginning of camp,” Mangino said, “he’d be the guy, lock, stock and barrel.”

Instead, he’ll spend the rest of the week battling Fowler, a fellow transfer out of Butler County Community College, for the starting nod.

As a true freshman punter at Bowling Green in 2006, Rojas totaled 56 punts for a 35.6 yard average, occasionally assisting with PATs (he was 2-for-3) and kicking off four times.

However, following what he considered a difficult situation – “That’s really a topic that I don’t like to touch,” he says of his time at the school – Rojas left Bowling Green, sitting out the ’07 season and searching for a school that felt right.

That school turned out to be Kansas, whose coaches told him that, as long as he performed adequately during preseason workouts, he’d be the team’s starting punter by the time the ’08 season rolled around.

With that promise having recently come to fruition, Rojas is now turning his attention to making the transition back to kicking, a position he hasn’t played with any regularity since his senior year of high school in ’05.

So far, he seems to be coming around nicely. His best kick in practice, he says, is a 67-yarder, and he considers his range to be 45-50 yards (“55, pushing it,” he says). As for the mental side of kicking, he should benefit from some of the pressure-induced drills special teams coordinator Louie Matsakis has been known to institute during practice.

“Obviously we can’t get 50,000 people in Memorial Stadium screaming and trying to simulate a game,” says Matsakis. “But there are things you can do right at the end of practice: Bring the kicker on the field and bring the whole team up and say, ‘Look, if he makes this kick, we’re not going to run after practice.’ … You have the whole team watching you, and you don’t want to upset the rest of the team. You can see how the kid reacts to that.”

In three days, it will likely become much more clear just how well-composed Rojas is. Saturday’s home-opener against Florida International will mark the first time in two years that Rojas has played in a Division-I football game. And with many of the team’s preseason concerns centered on special teams play, the performance of the team’s new punter (and maybe kicker) will likely be of great interest to a fan base searching for proof that the Jayhawks are capable of duplicating their ’07 success.

This is not a fact that is lost on Rojas.

“I’ve been out of it for a year, just watching football on TV, and I’m just ready to go,” he said Tuesday. “I told coach Matsakis the other day to let the reins loose and let me go out there and do my job, and I’m really looking forward to doing that.”

KU Quarterback Club kicks off season: The 2008 KU Quarterback Club will begin its season Thursday at Paddy O’Quigley’s inside the Holiday Inn Holidome at 200 McDonald Drive. The meeting, which will feature a guest appearance by Mangino as well as a complimentary buffet, will be held at 5 p.m. and immediately followed by “Hawk Talk with Mark Mangino.”

For more information, visit kuathletics.com.