For the first time ever in the program's 153 year history, Rutgers Football has won the program's first on-field national award in program history as punter Adam Korsak won the 2022 Ray Guy Award.
The Ray Guy Award is named after the best punter in football history in Ray Guy and is annually given to the college football's top punter after each season. This year that punter was none other than Scarlet Knights team captain Adam Korsak.
"It’s a huge honor," Korsak said in the local media press conference. "It’s very humbling. It’s been five years, I’ve been close the last couple it feels like. It’s an individual award, but it’s such a team award. What’s behind me right now, our culture; Family, Trust, Chop, that’s what we preach."
"I’m just so thankful that our culture has led us to have the foundation to where people put so much effort in on special teams and our coaching staff emphasizes it so much. For me huge for me, it's huge on the individual level but it’s just a testament to our culture and our team. I'm very proud and it's very humbling."
As mentioned above, Korsak is not only the first punter in school history to win the Ray Guy, but he is also the first Scarlet Knight ever to win an on-field national award in program history.
"I found that out the other day, it's such a huge honor," said Korsak. "It's hard to win these awards, it's very hard. You need a little bit of luck and need things to go your way. I think I'm just a testament of consistency and persistence over a long period of time, you know five years here. Again there's so many great players and I've just been so grateful to land here at Rutgers. I did hear that during the week and it's cool, it's great."
Over the past few seasons, you've heard report after report that Adam Korsak is the best pound for pound player on the Rutgers roster during his time on the banks and part of that is because of how consistent he has been.
Korsak attributes that consistency towards managing his emotions.
"I've been thinking about every bit of the last few weeks," Korsak said. "Managing your emotions to the best that you can possibly can, you don't let a good punt get you too high and you don't let a bad punt get you too low. You just kind of do your job every time. When you think about how I punt and how we punt at Rutgers, our emphasis is zero return yards and we achieved that this year with -11 yards. To get that you don't want to outkick your coverage too often and I did outkick my coverage a few times, but guys like Christian Izien, Christian Braswell and Max Melton, these guys bailed me out. The coaching staff emphasizes that and coach (Greg) Schiano just brought that zero return yard mentality towards all of us."
Next up for Korsak, he will continue training at Rutgers as he will be participating in the Reese's Senior Bowl early 2023 and then the Rutgers Pro Day, as he hopes to get a shot at showcasing his punting skills in the NFL.
"I've got a lot of aspirations in general, but over the next few months I have the Reese's Senior Bowl, which will be great," he said. "Also I have pro day and I'm already training at Rutgers at the moment, so I will be fully intending to give myself the best opportunity to play at the next level. One thing I'm fortunate with is that I have a lot of hobbies and a lot of interests, so I'm looking forward to seeing what the next chapter holds for sure."
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