2020 athlete Preston Zachman commits to UW

Heading into an official visit on June 21st, Preston Zachman was hopeful to receive an offer from the University of Wisconsin. While he had an awesome time on his visit, he watched as two other linebacker recruits committed days later to Paul Chryst’s staff. Zachman was seemingly the odd man out in a relatively small recruiting class.

The three-star recruit from Pennsylvania, was told to be patient. Nearly three months later, Zachman’s patience paid off.

On Thursday, September 12th, the versatile athlete was offered a scholarship, and he jumped on the opportunity a day later by informing the coaching staff of his commitment. Zachman took an unofficial visit to Wisconsin again this weekend for the Michigan game, and publicly announced his commitment on Saturday afternoon.

Zachman plays quarterback and outside linebacker for Southern Columbia Area High School in Catawissa, Pennsylvania. He has also lined up at wide receiver on the varsity.

His current size of 6-foot-2, 205 pounds gives him positional flexibility in a defense that uses many different personnels under Jim Leonhard. He will likely start out at either inside or outside linebacker, but could also be tasked with covered tight ends in space given his 4.56 verified forty yard dash time from an Opening Regional competition.

Other FBS offers that he earned through the recruiting process were Air Force, Army, Kent State, and Temple. While the offer list isn’t overly impressive, Wisconsin has done well with multi-sport athletes who were former high school quarterbacks. Alec Ingold, T.J. Edwards, Garrett Groshek, David Edwards, and Zack Baun, are just a few recent players to make an impact as Badgers who used to be signal-callers in high school.

Wisconsin is now up to 17 scholarship commitments for the 2020 recruiting class. With only around a dozen scholarship seniors, there must be additional room going forward. Wisconsin will likely continue to push for some higher rated recruits as the season continues such as Kaden Johnson and Joe Moore, as well as a running back to round out the class.

Keep up to date with recruiting and all things Badger related at Bucky’s 5th Quarter.