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French getting his kicks as UW's starter LUCAS AT LARGE MIKE LUCAS • UWBADGERS.COM U W assistant coach Charlie Partridge saw something on the practice field the other day that justified his confidence in placekicker Kyle French, who has filled the void for the injured Philip Welch. "The other specialists are getting loose, getting ready for practice," Partridge said, "and Kyle is already fully dressed and kicking from the spot where he had missed a field goal the day before. "I like his work ethic and I just love the way he approaches every day when he comes out to practice." Nobody, though, expected French to get on the field this early, including French, who was un- aware that Welch had suffered a leg injury over the summer that would limit him in training camp. "I honestly had no clue that he had his (quadriceps) injury," said French, a redshirt freshman from Menomonee Falls. "I knew it both- ered him a little bit but not to the extent that it actually was." Not that it mattered one way or another to French, who was more focused on what he could control. "I wanted to come in and com- pete and kind of show what I had to offer," he said. That was a much different urgency than he carried into camp last season. "Last year was kind of weird because I knew that I was going to redshirt," he said, "and just having that mindset threw me off a little — knowing if I had a bad day, it was a bad day." Nobody would notice, he thought, since nobody was counting on him. That's all changed. "Now if I have a bad day," he said, "I have to stay confident and come back and have a better day tomorrow." Although French missed an extra point in the opener — "Caught it with my toe not the sweet spot," he said — his Oregon State counter- part Trevor Romaine had a more inauspicious debut. Romaine, a freshman, had his game-winning field goal attempt go off the right upright on the final play of regulation against Sacra- mento State and the Beavers ended up losing in overtime. Such is the life of a kicking spe- cialist. French has had some good men- tors starting with his older brother, Joey French, who preceded him as the kicker at Menomonee Falls; and Brett Hartmann, who's now with the Houston Texans. Hartmann, 24, who had a stellar kicking career at Central Michigan, also hails from Menomonee Falls, where he was a four-year fixture as the placekicker and punter. Coming out of high school, Kyle French turned down scholarship offers from Wyoming and Northern Illinois to walk-on at the UW know- ing that he was in line for a tender once Welch graduated. It was during his junior year at Menomonee Falls that his talent began to surface. That was espe- cially true after he outkicked the competition at the Chris Sailer camp in Las Vegas. And that's when French began concentrating more on football than soccer. "There's kind of a big difference," he said, "between playing in front of 80,000 and a couple of hundred at a soccer game. I started falling more and more in love with kick- ing." French was playing varsity soc- cer at Menomonee Falls when he went out for football as a freshman. The first time that he attempted a field goal, he nailed a 52-yarder in practice. "The coach said, 'Yeah, I think there's a spot for you out here,'" French recalled. Partridge is thinking the same thing these days.