For Oklahoma Punter Luke Elzinga, Everything Has 'Worked Out Pretty Well'
NORMAN — On the south side of campus at Central Michigan University, on the southern edge of Mount Pleasant, MI, sits Kelly/Shorts Stadium, where the CMU Chippewas play their home games.
It’s a horseshoe configuration, with a two-tiered press box on one side. There’s an open end zone and the Chippewa Champions Club on the north side and a 100-foot-wide video board to the south.
The seating capacity is 30,255.
That’s where Oklahoma punter Luke Elzinga spent the first four years of his college football career.
Now, Elzinga suits up for the Oklahoma Sooners, one of the game’s blue bloods, and he kicks in 85,000-seat Oklahoma Memorial Stadium, one of its true cathedrals.
Of course, the size of the fields are exactly the same — 100 yards long, 53 yards wide. Still, It’s been an adjustment, Elzinga said Monday night.
“So, the resources they have here are awesome,” he said. “It’s definitely a bigger program. Fans are a lot more present, I’d say. So, that was definitely a change of pace.”
The 6-foot-4, 212-pound Elzinga came to OU in January from CMU via the NCAA Transfer Portal. As a three-year starter for the Chips, he earned first-team All-Mid American Conference three times, averaging 42.4 yards per punt in his career.
But at OU, he was recruited by special teams analyst Jay Nunez (formerly at Eastern Michigan) as a directional punter, a specialist whose job is to kick it from around midfield trying to pin the opponent deep near its goal line — “pooch punt,” coaches call it.
That was his role for six games, anyway.
Elzinga got his first OU start last Saturday against Central Florida, replacing Josh Plaster, and he was an underrated hero of Saturday’s 31-29 win: five punts for a 51.6-yard average (a long of 58 yards), four of them landing inside the UCF 20-yard line, and three of them fair caught with no return.
“It felt great,” he said. “It was my first time starting here, but at my old school I started for three years, so it wasn’t anything (new). Just tried to go at it with the same approach, tried to go out there levelheaded, just have fun, and it worked out pretty well.”
Two weeks before, Elzinga punted once (for 42 yards) in the Red River Rivalry victory over Texas.
Safe to say, after kicking before such small crowds at CMU, the insanity of the burnt orange/crimson crowd and the State Fair of Texas and the electricity of the 92,100-seat Cotton Bowl was something a little different.
“That was a heck of a game, I'll tell you that,” Elzinga said. “But just being in that environment just felt surreal. I've never played in a game like that before.”
And afterwards, Elzinga was front and center in the locker room, celebrating alongside his teammates with some sick dance moves.
“Yeah, I mean, it’s always fun in the locker room just to have fun with your teammates,” he said with a smile. “Just felt like I had something to show. Everybody played well. Everybody was in high spirits, so just had to get in there, show them how it’s done, show them that punters can dance too. We don’t just go out there and kick balls. We can have fun, too. So, yeah, that was a great time.”
Elzinga acknowledged that kickers and punters can go into slumps. He tries to battle that with a pre-kick routine.
“I just really go out there with an empty head every time and try to block out the noise,” he said. “Just go out there with an empty mind. I usually take one kind of big, deep breath right before I go, open my eyes, close my eyes and open them, then I'm ready to go.”
He said he sees only the center and the football.
“Everybody has bad days,” he said. “When you have those bad days, just try not to get in a deep, dark place in your mind, thinking that you’re not good enough. So, it’s just working on the positive things and building off those.”
One of Elzinga’s most recent influences is a former Sooner punter — and one of the most successful football players at his position to come out of Norman: Tress Way. Way started four years at OU, and has been one of the best punters in the NFL for the last 10 years. Way’s career punting average of 47.0 ranks sixth in NFL history and is second among punters with at least 10 years in the league.
“He came here, he’s a lefty,” Elzinga said. “I met him back in March and we just bonded over kicking, how we’re both lefties because it’s more of a rare thing nowadays. You mainly see righties. But he’s kind of a guy that I’ve looked up to. And then Thomas Morstead.”
Elzinga’s decision to leave his comfort zone and enter the portal sounds a lot like some of the new Sooners who play wide receiver or defensive end or safety.
“I was kind of just ready to move on from my old school,” he said. “I miss and love all the people there. They treated me super well. But I felt like it was time. God was really just pulling me in a direction to really challenge myself to get out of Michigan. Because I grew up in Michigan my entire life. So I really just needed to challenge myself and I wanted to play at high competition, high level.”
Nunez had been at rival Eastern Michigan and saw Elzinga punt up close. When he saw Elzinga’s name was in the portal, Nunez acted quickly.
“He was the first coach to talk to me and call me out of the portal,” Elzinga said. “We just built a great relationship. Everything progressed well. I just felt like I could have a successful career and enjoy the guys down here. It's been great ever since. I've loved every second of it down here.
“ … Don’t get me wrong, the guys at Central all cared about football. But I just feel like everybody here … has the same goal, and that’s just getting to a national championship and getting to the playoffs — and keep improving, like Venables says, go 1-0 every day.”
