AMHERST — There are few times a long snapper’s name is mentioned for a positive reason, and never is that when their name is booming from the speakers above the football field.
But several people within the UMass program believe fans should start getting to know Evan Deckers, because the sophomore has the potential to be the Minutemen’s next professional football player.
“Evan is very talented, he’s got a chance to possibly do that for a living,” coach Walt Bell said Thursday as his team prepared to host Liberty at noon Saturday. “I mean uber talented, incredibly important to him, how much he’s changed his body, how he trains in the weight room, he’s super talented and done a super nice job for us in a very thankless job. Typically no one notices that guy unless something really bad happens.”
Deckers took over the starting long snapper role full time this season and has done well enough to stay out of the spotlight thus far. He’s normally one of the first players to show up to practice each day and one of the last to leave, oftentimes racing the timer on the stadium lights after practice to get more work in with sophomore punter George Georgopoulos.
The two roommates make sure to utilize every opportunity they get to practice because they’re often limited to one, maybe two five-minute periods per day during practice to actually be involved. So they take the field an hour before practice to start their work then finish it as their teammates leave for the night.
“There’s an amount of time we can spend, then there’s an extra amount of time we choose to spend,” Deckers said. “They probably expect us not to stay out here, but George and I, (senior kicker Cooper Garcia), we’re always out here doing work after because we like to do it.”
Deckers was the punter on the junior varsity team at Avon Old Farms in Connecticut when he got his first chance as a long snapper. The varsity team’s long snapper was injured and the coaches asked Deckers to fill in. He ended up repeating his junior year at the school to help his prospects as a long snapper and impressed coaches with his performances at the various specialists camps around the country.
He said long snapping made sense to him because it holds the same principles as golf, the sport his dad has coached at Avon Old Farms for the past 20 years.
“It’s a lot of repeatable motion in golf,” Deckers said. “I just found that same exact feeling in long snapping, you do the same thing over and over again. There’s always something new that comes up and you have to fix it, which is fun for me.”
It is that work ethic to always be fine-tuning his craft that Georgopoulos said sets Deckers apart from others. He said Deckers is critical of himself and expects to deliver a perfect snap every time, and will work overtime to make sure every snap is on point.
This year, UMass has made extensive changes to its punting scheme, which alters what type of snap Deckers has to deliver every time. The Minutemen are rolling out Georgopoulos more for rugby-style kicks and also switching where the snap needs to land depending on the protection in front of Georgopoulos. Deckers said the different formations and angles are a joy to him because it helps him expand his arsenal of snaps and keeps him working hard.
It is also a major reason why he and Georgopoulos have to put in extra work before and after practice, making sure the communication and connection between the two are as strong as it can be heading into a game.
“This year it’s changed a lot, which is a challenge to me, but I loved it,” Deckers said. “We went back farther this year, we move left, we move right, I have to lead him sometimes, that’s why we’re out here after practice all the time. There’s so many different snaps we need to learn and with me, I have a system, if it’s a certain snap, I do it a certain way.”
Josh Walfish can be reached at jwalfish@gazettenet.com. Follow him on Twitter @JoshWalfishDHG. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage.