{"id":75881,"date":"2025-08-01T06:00:02","date_gmt":"2025-08-01T10:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=75881"},"modified":"2025-09-20T14:41:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-20T18:41:08","slug":"75881-progression-at-wake-forest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2025\/08\/01\/75881-progression-at-wake-forest\/","title":{"rendered":"Progress at Wake Forest"},"content":{"rendered":"

The progression project that is Wake Forest football continued through day three of Fall camp<\/a> on Thursday. The defense is still ahead of the offense. Is the defense that good? Or is the offense lacking? Or is it some of both? The offense closed the gap a little Thursday, emphasis on \u201cA little.\u201d Thursday was the first day with shoulder pads and<\/em> helmets for practice.<\/p>\n

Familiar Legacy<\/h3>\n

Wake has three players with an NFL gene pool on their resumes. Defensive linemen Langston and Camden Hardy are the sons of former NFL all-pro Kevin Hardy.<\/p>\n

And on Thursday, the media met with another NFL legacy player. Defensive lineman Gabe Kirschke is the son of former NFL defensive lineman Travis Kirschke.<\/p>\n

Travis played his college ball at UCLA from 1994 to 1997. He had 104 total tackles and six-and-a-half sacks over his Pac-10 career.\u00a0 Kirschke went undrafted in 1996 but signed a free agent contract with the Detroit Lions. He played five seasons in Detroit before signing as a free agent with San Francisco. After one season with the 49ers, he moved on to Pittsburgh, where he played another six seasons. He\u2019s got a Super Bowl ring from the 2005 team.<\/p>\n

Now his son is a redshirt junior defensive end at Wake Forest. Gabe Kirschke spent his freshman season at Wisconsin, where he redshirted, and then moved on to Colorado State for two years before arriving in Winston-Salem.<\/p>\n

Father and son bear a profile resemblance. But Travis was bigger in his playing days than his son is. Travis was 6\u2019-3\u201d, 298 pounds in his playing days. Gabe is currently listed at 6\u2019-5\u201d, 250 pounds.<\/p>\n

\"Progression
Photo from Tony Siracusa<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Transition for the Younger Kirschke<\/h3>\n

Gabe said he has bulked up a little bit since his move to Wake Forest. \u201cI feel like I have put on a lot of good muscle. I love the strength staff,\u201d he said Thursday.<\/p>\n

He said the defense under new head coach Jake Dickert is similar to what he had at Colorado State, so the on-field transition has been easier for him.<\/p>\n

Of course, he also grew up with his dad being quite a position tutor. \u201cI\u2019ve been in a three-point stance since I was like four years old,\u201d he joked. Or maybe it wasn\u2019t so much of a joke. \u201cI was hitting the pillow and working on my get-off.\u201d<\/p>\n

Life Lessons<\/h3>\n

It turns out the tutoring went well beyond football. \u201cHaving him in my life and being able to speak to me has been huge,\u201d Gabe said. \u201cBeing able to bounce back from things. Being able to process through football and life, and how to balance everything is really, really awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gabe said he and his dad have worked on football technique, but there has been more. \u201cThe big part is the mindset and what he\u2019s allowed to pour into me with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The athletics are not confined to Gabe. His sister Ella was a swimmer at UCLA, and his younger brother Blake is on the Lacrosse team at the University of Denver. Dad Travis is a high school football coach in Highlands Ranch, Colorado.<\/p>\n

The Pass Catchers<\/h3>\n

There may not be the marquee name in the Wake Forest receivers\u2019 room as in years past. There is no Donavon Greene or AT Perry. But what lacks in big name is being made up for in depth. Micah Mays, Jr<\/a>.\u00a0 has ascended to become one of the leaders of a position group that goes several deep. Carlos Hernandez, Sterling Berkhalter, Karate Brenson and Jeremiah Melvin are among the names that likely will be factors in the Wake offense this season.<\/p>\n

Mays said for the most part, the receivers have the offense down but are getting used to catching passes from three different quarterbacks, each with their own style and rhythm.<\/p>\n

Mays said he worked with freshman Steele Pizzella a lot during the Summer. \u201cThe thing about Steele is, he\u2019ll come 30 minutes earlier, do his stretches, bring his sheet (with pass patterns). He\u2019s fully locked and loaded.\u201d Mays said Pizzella is different than any freshman he has played with before in the level of preparation he goes through.<\/p>\n

He said the team has loosened up from that rough first day. And being from Palm Beach Gardens, FL, the heat and humidity of the early days of camp have not been an issue for Mays. He says he has been assisting his teammates.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll get the water bottle and I\u2019ll go around and pour it down their neck, pour it down their shirt, pour it on their head, just pour it everywhere,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to just get used to the heat, because the heat\u2019s not going anywhere,\u201d he opined.<\/p>\n

Main Image: Neville E. Guard-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The progression project that is Wake Forest football continued through day three of Fall camp on Thursday. The defense is still ahead of the offense. Is the defense that good? Or is the offense lacking? Or is it some of both? The offense closed the gap a little Thursday, emphasis on \u201cA little.\u201d Thursday was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1534,"featured_media":75886,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,7,35643],"tags":[35381,9582,35382,1249],"class_list":["post-75881","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-acc","category-wake-forest-demon-deacons","tag-gabe-kirschke","tag-jake-dickert","tag-travis-kirschke","tag-wake-forest-demon-deacons"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75881","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1534"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75881"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75881\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75899,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75881\/revisions\/75899"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75881"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75881"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75881"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}