Jude Kelley has taken but four kickoffs this season for Georgia Tech. Gavin Stewart has taken the other 37. Together, they form a kickoff tandem that perhaps no other team in FBS can match.
On the strength of his well-struck kickoffs, Stewart is tied for 35th in FBS and is fifth in the ACC in touchback percentage (64.9%). He’s by far Tech’s best kickoff specialist since Harrison Butker kicked his last for Tech in 2016.
“It’s definitely satisfying,” Stewart said Wednesday. “I love it.”
Kelley’s ball-striking wizardry was on display Saturday, when he successfully executed two onside kicks that kept the Jackets’ comeback hopes alive in the final two minutes of their eventual 48-40 loss at Virginia. He is now 3-for-3 this season on onside kicks (he converted his first against Clemson; coach Dabo Swinney called it the “perfect, perfect onside kick”) and 5-for-5 in his career.
“The goal is for me not to go out on the field,” Kelley said. “But it’s a cool situation in that an onside kick’s not something people really expect you to recover. But going out there, knowing your team kind of needs it, is a little boost, I think.”
Last season, the Jackets’ kickoff duties were held by Austin Kent, whose 26.8% touchback rate was an improvement on seasons past. Stewart, a walk-on from Benedictine Military Academy in Savannah, had a role as a kicker and wide receiver. After getting hurt in the spring playing receiver, the younger brother of former Tech receiver Brad Stewart began working more on kicking.
“It just kind of clicked to me, and I just kept working with it and adding a couple extra yards on the kickoffs,” he said.
Stewart said improvements in technique, such as becoming consistent in kicking the same spot on the ball, and having fresher legs have made the difference with his distance and trajectory. Last season was the first time he was strictly a kicker, so he was having to learn a routine to bring him to peak form for games.
“I feel like one thing last year was my legs kind of were dead throughout the season,” Stewart said. “And to get time to recover and figure out the best way for myself to keep them healthy throughout the season, that’s just the part I’m talking about whenever I’m saying clicking, just technique and everything.”
Beyond his 24 touchbacks, another seven have been fair caught. That has quashed the threat of opponents breaking long returns while also reducing the potential for injury on kickoff plays. Moreover, thanks to the efforts of the kickoff team, the longest return by an opponent has been 28 yards. The success has not come as a surprise to Stewart.
“I feel like I have a pretty strong leg, so I just had to kind of figure out the bits and pieces and correlate it into a consistent approach and ball contact and everything,” he said.
Stewart’s leg will be especially important Saturday against Virginia Tech, as Hokies return man Keshawn King leads the ACC in kickoff return average at 28.3 yards per return.
Kelley has found a spot this season as the onside kick specialist after struggling last year as a placekicker as a freshman walk-on out of Allatoona High. When kicker Brent Cimaglia arrived as a grad transfer from Tennessee, Kelley approached the addition with maturity.
“Last year was definitely a learning year,” Kelley said. “Got all that out of the way. Having somebody like Brent come in, who’s very experienced, I just looked at it as a positive. I can learn a lot from him, which I have.”
His consistency improved, Kelley pushed Cimaglia in the preseason and has continued the competition in practice.
“We’re pretty close,” Kelley said. “He’ll claim one thing, I’ll claim another. It’s pretty neck and neck, I think.”
He developed a knack for onside kicks by playing around with different ball placements on the tee and striking different spots on the ball. Having a background as a soccer player helped.
“It was just kind of like you go out and you kick a football around, just kind of see what kind of trick shots you can do with it,” Kelley said. “That’s why it’s fun.”
Kelley said his two onside kicks against Virginia – one of which bounced high in the air, where Malachi Carter caught it on the sideline, and the other, which Juanyeh Thomas caught off the hop at chest level in full stride – were two different types of kicks.
“I kind of figured out a couple different things to make it bounce differently,” Kelley said. “But those are a couple secrets we’ll keep.”
Kelley said he has three or four onside kicks that he’s comfortable with and a couple of more that he’s trying to develop consistency with. With no small help from the kickoff team, Kelley’s 5-for-5 career mark – he pulled off two last year against Boston College and Notre Dame – truly is remarkable. In the past two seasons, the 13 other ACC teams are 5-for-27.
“Impressive what he does in that phase of the game,” coach Geoff Collins said Tuesday.
For his performance, which also included an actual kickoff after he and the kickoff team lined up in onside kick formation that pinned the Cavaliers inside their 5-yard line, Kelley was named ACC specialist of the week.
“I didn’t expect that,” Kelley said. “That was pretty cool.”
After Cimaglia (who is 9-for-12 on field-goal tries) departs after the season, the competition will open again between Kelley and Stewart, along with Aidan Birr, a kicker from Texas who committed to the 2022 signing class.
“It’s just kind of taking this year to learn as much as we can and almost ease any nerves,” Kelley said. “I’m definitely a lot more comfortable than I was last year. I just think once you get to that point, everything will play out how it’s supposed to.”
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