Grafton tackle always looked to UW
Prior to the 2020 prep football season, the Journal Sentinel will reveal the Supreme 17, a look at the top players in the area. Each day before the first day of practice Sept. 6, one player will be revealed with a feature story. This is our 13th installment. View the entire list of athletes here.
Jim Norris still passes the mail that comes in for his brother-in-law to him. It's part of the job, after all.
Norris is the head football coach at Grafton High School, where throughout the year his office receives a steady flow of recruiting letters and messages from colleges throughout the country.
The incoming cards and letters often make a player's day. Many are undecided in their plans and see that a college program is interested in them.
That doesn't apply to Norris' brotherin-law, Black Hawks senior offensive tackle JP Benzschawel, though.
He throws just about every one of them out.
A firm commitment
Clemson. Tennessee. Stanford. Michigan State. That is just the tip of the spear of all the schools that are still trying to recruit Benzschawel to play for them after he graduates next summer.
“It's every Power 5 conference and multiple teams in each conference reaching out,” Norris said.
Those schools, which include some of the top programs in the country, are just doing their due diligence with one of the top offensive line recruits in the country and the No. 1 rated player in the state. Benzschawel just isn't interested.
He committed verbally to Wisconsin as a sophomore in February 2019, accepting the Badgers' scholarship offer immediately after it was extended.
Both of Benzschawel's brothers, Beau and Luke, played football at UW, as did his father, Scott, and uncle, Eric. His grandfather was a rower for the Badgers and served as the president of the National W Club. His grandmother is a loyal season ticket holder at Camp Randall.
“I'm a die-hard Badgers fan,” Benzschawel told the Journal Sentinel last year. “I never liked any other college, so it would have been extremely hard to pick a different one.”
Norris, married to JP's sister Abbey, has known Benzschawel long before he rose to his current status as a recruit and says that, outside of his physical development, JP hasn't changed as the attention has rushed in.
“When I first got to know JP, he was a blue-collar, hard-working kid that worked his tail off,” Norris said. “That's exactly the way he is now. He's still getting calls and offers from schools all over. He doesn't publicize them, he doesn't put them out on social media. He calls coaches back and says he appreciates the offer and the time, but he just wants to go to Wisconsin.”
The UW staff, in return, appreciates the full-on commitment from Benzschawel that hasn't once wavered.
“They definitely respect it,” Norris said. “It's a unique perspective, knowing their staff as well as I do, and they love that stuff. It's cool for kids to get that attention, but ultimately it's just attention.”
Pushing cars and lifting propane tanks
UW was onto Benzschawel from an early point in his high school career, thanks in part to having a couple of older brothers in the program.
“I don't think he felt that pressure a ton,” Norris said. “You see it sometimes as a brother-in-law, some things become a little overwhelming. But it goes back to the kind of kid he is. He just wants to play football and get in the weight room and get better.”
With Beau, an offensive lineman for the Detroit Lions, home for most of the spring and summer due to the coronavirus pandemic, he and JP found ways to stay in shape.
That included pushing cars up a hill, lifting propane tanks and other “crazy stuff,” as Norris describes it.
“Everyone had to get inventive,” Norris said. “Beau got onto the field in Grafton a number of times and JP went with them. At home, whatever they could find to lift, to move, to push, to carry, they were moving it.”
That work ethic played a large role in UW's being comfortable enough to offer Benzschawel as a sophomore. His natural ability on the field didn't hurt, either.
At 6-foot-7 and 270 pounds, Benzschawel has the ability to move his feet quickly and bend at the knees while maintaining strong balance; he's about as fluid as it gets at the high school level. As he has gotten older, he's also developed a knack for finishing off blocks on a play-by-play basis.
“He finishes plays, takes guys to the ground and always comes up with great pancake numbers,” Norris said. “So it's all about playing with that certain nasty streak that he has every single down.”
If Benzschawel isn't in the midst of the football season, then there's a good he's chance either in the weight room or doing schoolwork. And if he's doing neither of those things, you can almost certainly find him out fishing, where he's far away from the calls from college coaches.
“There's always that pressure of being rated the top player in Wisconsin,” Norris said. “There's that pressure, but you talk and work with him every day and you would never know it. He's unbelievable in the weight room, a great leader on and off the field.
“The Badgers are getting a good one.”