Nebraska Football Signee Analysis: Defensive Lineman Kade Pietrzak

Nebraska football is losing a ton of production from the front line of its defense. If you include the Jack position, which primarily served as a fourth down lineman, the Huskers are losing eight of their top 12 players from last season in terms of snaps played.

While coaches held out Riley Van Poppel — don’t get me started — that still leaves only five returnees you feel comfortable with heading into 2025. There will be spots to be won this offseason and although none of Nebraska’s impressive incoming freshmen are enrolling early, there’s still a good possibility that a couple of them move the needle enough this summer to work their way onto the field this fall.

Kade Pietrzak was a late bloomer whose recruitment didn’t really get started until the fall of his junior season. A two-way standout for West Fargo (N.D.) Sheyenne High School, Pietrzak was originally looked at by most schools as an offensive line recruit.

As a junior, he was named North Dakota Class 3A first-team all-state after finishing the season with 72 tackles, including 19 tackles for loss and two sacks. Teams quickly shifted gears and prioritized Pietrzak as a defensive line target. His stock exploded during the January evaluation period and he became one of the most sought after D-line recruits in the Midlands and Midwest regions.

Pietrzak visited Lincoln for Matt Rhule’s first Husker home game on Sept. 16, 2023, to watch Nebraska take on Northern Illinois. Two days later, on Monday Sept. 18, the Huskers gave him his second Power Four offer. He’d gotten his first major scholarship offer from Kansas State after a standout performance at the Wildcats’ Elite Camp on July 30.

Over the next few months, Nebraska built a good relationship with Pietrzak, who attended junior days at Nebraska (Jan. 20), Minnesota (Jan. 27) and Wisconsin (Feb. 3) before taking unofficial visits in the spring to Kansas State (March 29), Oklahoma (April 6) and Wisconsin (April 13), as he narrowed his list of around 30 offers to a final group. On May 26, the 6-foot-5, 260-pound Pietrzak named a top four of Oklahoma, Kansas State, Nebraska and Wisconsin.

Pietrzak’s recruitment was hard to get a read on. Despite taking several visits — both official and unofficial — during his recruitment, Pietrzak rarely did interviews and when he did he had little to say about his decision process. To say he kept his cards close to the vest would be an understatement. He simply didn’t talk to recruiting services and virtually nobody in his inner circle did either.

Even so, it was widely believed he had been a hard Oklahoma lean coming into the spring and that Wisconsin was running in second place.

Pietrzak reportedly tried to commit to Oklahoma prior to the month of June when he had a few official visits already lined up to some of his finalists. Brent Venables, who handled his recruitment personally, has a no-visit policy for commitments so Pietrzak decided to hold off so he could take visits to do his due diligence and make sure he was making the right decision.

The expectation was that those visits would only serve to solidify his desire to play for the Sooners. He took subsequent visits to Wisconsin (May 31), Oklahoma (June 7) and Kansas State (June 21). Sandwiched between his trips to Norman and Manhattan was his visit to Nebraska for the weekend of June 14.

Pietrzak was hosted by offensive lineman Gibson Pyle and felt he fit in very well with the players and culture. He also came away impressed by the family atmosphere around the program. Former defensive coaches Terrance Knighton and Tony White played big roles in his recruitment, as did head coach Matt Rhule, strength and conditioning coach Corey Campbell and director of player personnel Keith Williams.

Nebraska’s facilities and fan support also stood out to Pietrzak, who in a rare post-visit interview talked about Nebraska’s plan to play him at multiple positions along the D-line and how much he liked the Huskers’ plan for developing and utilizing him.

Despite the positive experience, by all accounts it was Kansas State that came out of his stretch of visits considered to be Oklahoma’s biggest competition. Most believed Nebraska and Wisconsin were on the outside looking in and that his recruitment would ultimately come down to the Wildcats or Sooners.

No coaching staff had a longer-standing relationship with him than Kansas State. Head coach Chris Klieman built a juggernaut at North Dakota State and his name and pedigree still carries a ton of weight in the Peace Garden State. Sheyenne High School is just 10 miles from the Fargo Dome, and Pietrzak and his family had front-row seats to watch the program Klieman and other coaches on K-State’s staff built.

A decision was expected shortly after his run of official visits, but as his recruitment went deeper into July, momentum swung in favor of the Huskers. By mid-July, the narrative around Pietrzak’s recruitment had changed completely. The Huskers made up a ton of ground and were suddenly being talked about as the team to beat.

The relationships he’d built with Terrance Knighton and Matt Rhule, specifically, gave the Huskers staying power — but you can’t overlook the NIL factor. Pietrzak was arguably Nebraska’s top D-line target and with Oklahoma primed to add him to their class, the 1890 Initiative stepped up and increased its offer.

There were subtle hints from the Husker staff via social media breadcrumbs before Pietrzak went public with his commitment on July 21. Although his finalists were regional, he collected Power Four offers from coast to coast, including Arizona State, Auburn, Boston College, Duke, Florida, Florida State, Iowa, Iowa State, Kansas, Kentucky, Miami, Michigan State, Minnesota, Missouri, Stanford, Texas A&M, UCLA, USC and Washington.

Pietrzak is an On3 four-star recruit and ranked the No. 220 overall player in the country. A three-year starter, Pietrzak helped Sheyenne win the Class 3A state championship as a senior with the program also winning the 2A state championship in 2021.

A two-time first-team all-state selection, Pietrzak was named Gatorade Player of the Year for North Dakota and MaxPreps North Dakota High School Football Player of the Year as a senior after playing on both the offensive and defensive lines and finishing with 58 tackles, 26 tackles for loss, and five sacks.

College programs loved Pietrzak’s versatility with some schools looking at him as either a defensive end or defensive tackle. I can see Pietrzak playing primarily the four or five and sliding inside to the three on passing downs.

With an impressive frame and natural tools, it won’t be a surprise if the plan is for him to grow into a 3-tech permanently and fill the same role Ty Robinson held. I would personally lean toward that developmental path and play him inside rather than outside.

As you would expect, Pietrzak was a man among boys and a complete game-wrecker on both sides of the ball for Sheyenne. He’s explosive and has rare burst off the line and pairs it with a high level of aggression and hustle. He plays hard and he plays to the whistle.

He’s fluid and has a strong center of gravity with impressive pass-rushing moves for a player his size. Plays with an extremely high-motor and consistently runs down ballcarriers and quarterbacks from behind while chasing plays.

Pietrzak is a tremendous prospect with huge upside. He’ll be a great piece of clay for new D-line coach Terry Bradden to work with. He boasts a 31-inch vertical jump and 9-foot-4 broad jump, which are impressive metrics for his size. I’ll be interested where Husker coaches envision him along the line. He could play anywhere other than the nose and thrive.

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