East Ridge's Luke Ryerse commits to Gopher football team

WOODBURY, Minn. — Luke Ryerse is used to the isolation.

"If people are trying to guess my position it's not usually punter that they guess first," Ryerse said. "People usually scoff at it a little bit, which I completely understand."

The East Ridge punter and kicker is a specialized weapon on the gridiron. On the diamond, the senior is a top prospect in the Class of 2025 and his Raptors baseball team is back-to-back state champions.

"We had a great team. Incredible environment," said Ryerse, who will go for the three-peat in the spring. "Some of my best friends for life came from that team and I'm sure I'll know those guys for a long time. that's a really big deal for me."

He's a righty pitcher and a right-footed punter and kicker. The pursuit of perfection fits Ryerse's approach to sports.

"It's a lot like golf, which is why I really enjoy golf as a hobby," he said. "Same with pitching. It's you versus you. I love how you're always working on mechanics. Things you can control."

Elite performance in two sports is hard, but there's overlap when Ryserse hits the gym.

"It's kinda one whole movement. That's how I like it. I don't look at it as two sports anymore," said Ryerse. "I kinda just look at it as two different movements that I practice daily."

Ryerse was committed to being a dual-sport athlete at Alabama, but when Nick Saban retired, things changed.

"Yeah there were some coaching changes that didn't really fit my needs with be able to play two sports," said Ryerse. "The opinions changed on allowing guys to play two sports. I wanted to continue playing both in college and I felt like Minnesota was a great opportunity for me to do that."

So this summer, Ryerse flipped to Minnesota.

"It'll be very interesting to be in Athletes Village for probably 12 hours a day and then go home and study," said Ryerse. "But it'll be a lot of fun."