ESPN College Football

Posted by ESPN.com's Adam Rittenberg

	Jeff Hanisch-US PRESSWIRE
	At 6-3, 198 pounds, Indiana's Austin Starr isn't built like your average kicker.

After sitting down next to Indiana All-American Austin Starr in the lunch room last week, I told him he doesn't look like a kicker.

"To that I say, thanks," Starr replied. "A lot of [NFL] scouts have come and I've heard they ask, 'How tall is he?'"

He's 6-foot-3 and 198 pounds and could easily blend in with the wide receivers, quarterbacks or defensive backs during Hoosiers practices. Unlike his short-statured kicking colleagues, Starr doesn't stick out among the giants.

During a trip to Chicago last month for Big Ten football Media Days, Starr went to ESPN Zone and began playing the quarterback simulation in the facility's Sports Arena.

"I got one of the highest scores that the people who collect the points had ever seen," Starr said. "And there were these high school kids there and one said, 'Do you play quarterback for a college?' And I said, 'No, I'm a kicker. But thanks, though.'"

Starr won't be able to fool anyone much longer. The fifth-year senior enters the fall as a top candidate for the Lou Groza Award after converting a school-record 21 field goals on 23 attempts last season. Starr has converted all 78 extra-point attempts in his career.

He's projected to be one of the top three or four kickers selected in April's NFL draft and could improve his stock with another strong season. Starr is also responsible for the most significant kick in recent Indiana history, a game-winning 49-yarder in the final minute against Purdue last November that clinched the team's first bowl berth since 1993.

But before he proved himself with his right foot, Starr set out to prove he could transcend the kicker stereotype -- small, slow, separate from the rest. A former soccer player who didn't start football until his sophomore year of high school, Starr showcased his athleticism immediately after arriving at Indiana.

"When I was still trying to establish myself as the kicker here," Starr said, "the only way I could get respect from my teammates was to beat them at something that they have pride in. So I beat some guys in the three-cone drill in winter conditioning. When guys on your team see that you're working harder than they are, that's instant respect right there."

Starr continues to stand out. As the team ran sprints at last Wednesday's practice, he always was among the first to cross the goal line.

But his duties have limits.

"[The coaches] would prefer that I don't tackle anybody," said Starr, an Academic All-American who will pursue dentistry after his football career. "Because I've tried to in practice and they've gotten upset."

It's understandable, given his value as a specialist. Starr points to a game-winning kick against Illinois in 2006 as the turning point in his career, but the Purdue kick likely will always be the most memorable.

It clinched a bowl berth and fulfilled Indiana's pledge to late coach Terry Hoeppner, who died earlier in the year and had established the motto of "Play 13."

"I remember after the kick seeing Mrs. [Jane] Hoeppner on the sideline and she was just beside herself, screaming," Starr said. "They have a video of her face when the ball went through the uprights and she had her hands together and said, 'Oh, thank you, Lord.' I know that she was talking to her husband throughout that entire game and obviously coach was with us.

"I was just fortunate to be put in that situation."

Starr recognizes the pressure of each kick but doesn't get affected by it.

"Whenever I take my steps back I know I'm going to make it," Starr said. "I'm very surprised when I miss."