Huskers Add Greyshirt to Class of 2008

January 8, 2007 by Steve Hanway

For those (like me) who had some concern about the lack of offensive lineman in the class of 2007, more good news arrived this past week as Norfolk Catholic offensive lineman Aaron Schulte accepted a greyshirt offer at Nebraska. Schulte has prototypical tackle size at 6’6” and 320 lbs. but clearly he will benefit for more time to get stronger and faster.

The Huskers now have oral commitments from five offensive lineman in the combined classes of 2007 and 2008. Schulte joins Jaivorio Burkes and Marcel Jones from the class of 2007 and Dan Hoch and Baker Steinkuhler from the class of 2008. Ironically, Burkes is the shortest member of the two classes at 6’4” even though he is the most highly rated. The other four lineman are all listed as 6’6” or taller. This makes the group even longer than the heralded class of 2006 who aside from Victory Haines at 6’7” all ranged between 6’3” and 6’5”.

It’s not clear whether Schulte received other scholarship offers and he rates only two stars from Rivals.com so on paper he doesn’t look like an all-conference type player. But if we compare Schulte to in-state players of recent vintage, he seems comparable in many ways to Mike Huff from Ralston, Nebraska. Huff was 6’5” and 305 lbs. coming out of high school, similar and slightly smaller than Schulte out of high school. Huff was the 14th-rated in-state player in 2004 and Schulte is the 9th-rated player this year. Huff was a bit stronger coming out of high school, but with Schulte’s extra greyshirt year he could close the gap on Huff by the time he uses his first year of eligibility. Not to mention the extra year Schulte will have to learn the west coast offense.

Considering Huff has started most of the season as only a sophomore and that the Huskers finished with the second-best offense in the conference, Huff seems to have been well worth the scholarship he earned in 2004. Hopefully, Schulte can rise to that level as well whether it’s as a starter or two-deep player.

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