Midway through the first quarter against Akron, redshirt senior tight end Eric Steffes lined up on a third and sixth as one of the two players at the end of the Wisconsin line of scrimmage. When the ball was snapped, Steffes ran a successful whip route, pretending to go across the middle of the field, before halting, spinning and sprinting toward the sideline. Redshirt senior quarterback Bart Houston pumped once and stepped up in the pocket before finding the open Steffes for a first down.
For the Badgers it was just another first down, one of their 32 on the afternoon. But for Steffes, every play he makes on the football field is a result of an athletic dilemma that led him to the Wisconsin football team.
Steffes didn’t always want to be a Badger football player. In fact, his favorite sport growing up wasn’t even football; it was hockey.
“I started skating I think when I was two or three years old. I had two older brothers that got into hockey, so that was the first sport I ever played, and I loved it,” said the senior tight end.
The Mount Calvary, Wis., native played Triple A hockey during his youth days, traveling all over the Midwest and up into Canada, something that he seldom did for football. Steffes tried out for Team Wisconsin, a travel team for the best players in the state, during his sophomore year of high school, but got cut. Had he made the team though, Steffes said he probably would have quit football to concentrate on the sport he first fell in love with.
“It’s probably for the best,” he said. “During the fall they’d be playing hockey games, and I probably would have done that instead of football.”
Steffes doesn’t really have a favorite team, nor does he have a favorite player, he really just loves the game itself. And although he hasn’t played competitive hockey since high school, he hasn’t lost all of his talent.
“I’ve heard legends that he was on intramurals for a while back in his freshman year,” senior long-snapper Connor Udelhoven said. “He was a pretty good puck player, him and [Derek] Strauss would always play a little bit.”
Steffes has even asked about playing with the Badger hockey team in a more competitive atmosphere, but it’s never really worked out timing wise, likely due to the non-stop schedules of both UW programs. He has skated “multiple times” since coming to Madison, but only a handful of times with the guys on the team.
His dreams of playing hockey at a high level have probably melted away. After all, Steffes is a UW football player, not a hockey player. He’s improved his pass blocking and route running for the Badgers, and he has emerged as a leader for many of the teams’ young pass catchers.
Nonetheless, he still loves the game of hockey.
“To be honest,” Steffes said laughing in embarrassment, “Hockey is probably still my favorite sport even in front of football. But obviously, football worked out just fine for me.”
