Iowa football: Multi-sport athlete TJ Hockenson is now stud tight end

Iowa football tight end TJ Hockenson came from small-town roots where he was a multi-sport high school athlete. Now he’s one of the nation’s top tight ends.

Next to Preseason All-American Noah Fant, it’s easy to overlook TJ Hockenson despite the fact that the redshirt sophomore tight end from Chariton, Iowa is currently the Hawkeyes leading receiver with 287 receiving yards. This may be the case with national media, but Iowa football fans saw this coming after a freshman season that saw him haul in 24 catches for 324 yards. Now in his third season in Brian Ferentz’s offense, Hockenson is thriving.

Through just five games this season, he has almost surpassed last season’s number and he is beginning to get recognition. Against Northern Illinois, Hockenson was named to Pro Football Focus’ Big Ten team of the week, and in the preseason he was named to the Mackey Award Watch List.

Although he was a three-star prospect, he was pretty raw when coming to the Iowa football program. In Tuesday’s media conference, Kirk Ferentz spoke a little bit on recruiting Hockenson and what they say in him as a high schooler.

"The first thing that caught our attention was his production both on the football field, but also on the basketball court. His story is not the same as but it’s a little like Ike Boettger. When Ike came down, we asked him to come back with pads on, and he couldn’t block anybody, but his attitude was really — it showed in camp, and T.J. the same way. They really didn’t ask him to do much blocking in his high school program, for good reason. I mean, he was catching 8 million balls."

Oddly enough, he is on the field more than Fant now even though Fant is the more talented receiver. This is because he more versatile in the sense that he can be in on any down due to his block abilities.

Coming out of high school, one of the biggest things Kirk Ferentz loved about Hockenson was the fact that he didn’t focus primarily on football. Apparently, that’s a big draw for Kirk and the Iowa football program in general.

"I’ll tell you, not that any parents are going to listen to me, but I’m so in favor of, and anybody I talk to that knows anything about athletics I think kind of feels the same way, especially guys that are coaching, our former players. The value of playing other sports is so underrated."

He went on to name a few other great Iowa football players who played multiple sports.

"I just mentioned Dallas [Clark]. You go right down the list, there’s so many guys. Nate Kaeding was a multi, three-time captain, right, three state championship teams. What they gain from playing other sports is so valuable."

As he produces more and more, attention will shift towards the young tight end. In Indiana coach Tom Allen’s media conference he indirectly called out the value Hockenson brings to the team.

"I just think this they utilize their tight ends extremely well. They catch a lot of balls. They look at the stats and they lead their team in catches and really long, athletic, tough."

While some may be worried about the prospect of Noah Fant leaving after this season, I am personally excited to see TJ Hockenson continue to grow and potentially become the focal point of the offense next year as the number one receiving option.