NASHVILLE—-Linus Zunk was the type of doughty forward that a coaching staff desperate to form an identity within a team that was lacking one could conceivably bring in with the intention to change their culture. Zunk was undersized to play the four at the Division-I level and wasn’t the trendy, toolsy Nike circuit star that most programs gravitate towards. His frame was more reminiscent of a football player and so were the aspects of his skillset that would’ve allowed coaches to believe that he could wake up the rest of their loafing players. 

Zunk was a dogged defender that showcases a steal, fastbreak dunk and relentless defense on the inbounder as his only publicly-posted basketball highlight. In a way, that video was a microcosm of his game. Had he made it, the Berlin, Germany, native’s skillset would’ve been most applicable as a dirty-work, make the right play swingman. He would’ve been an annoyance to his teammates, who would’ve consistently seen him highlighted in film study as the antithesis of their shortcomings. 

The dirty-work mindset never stopped Zunk from dreaming about what a professional basketball career would’ve been like, though. Zunk’s father was a basketball player in his younger days, which encouraged Zunk to pursue some sort of basketball career alongside of the soccer career that he was all but indoctrinated into as a kid in Europe. 

Zunk’s high school experience differed from his American teammates at Vanderbilt in that he was forced to play basketball for a club team rather than his high school. Eventually the travel–an hour and a half drive each way–caught up to Zunk as he progressed through school and eventually racked up more family responsibilities that prompted him to realize that he “can’t be gone all day.” The Berlin native eventually stopped playing basketball as a result. 

It could’ve been characterized as a vulnerable moment when a few guys from Zunk’s school came up to him with a solution to his sports dilemma. 

“You should try football,” they said. “You look like you could be pretty good at it.”

At that point Zunk didn’t know much about football, all he had seen was Rob Gronkowski–who was his favorite player–highlights on YouTube as well as the show Blue Mountain State–which he now laughs off.

The then 15 year old was hardly an outlier in his community at that point. Zunk says football is a “niche sport” in his soccer-first community. To some “football isn’t even on the map.” When high school teams take the field, it’s often in club format and only “a few of the parents” and “maybe a few old people from around the block” attend the games. 

Zunk was completely foreign to the idea of the crowds that he’d encounter as a college football player in the United States drew or what his football career could become when he first took his friends up on their offer and initially agreed to play tight end before his defensive line coach came up to him and laid it on thick while asking him to play both ways. 

The then sophomore agreed to the offer and gave it his best, but had no real sense of what to do when he lined up each down. The current Vanderbilt defensive end may have a difficult time watching the 15-year old version of himself. 

“He was horrible,” Zunk told Vandy on SI of his feedback towards his younger self. “Football over there is terrible, man. You win off of either athleticism or just knowing a little bit about the game, but if I knew 10% of the stuff as a sophomore as I know now about how to play football, I would’ve been a way better high school player.” 

The Linus Zunk that walks alongside a member of Vanderbilt’s communications staff with a 6-foot-6, 270 pound frame, pads on and a significant role on an AP Top 25 team may have been nearly unrecognizable to a 13-year old version of Zunk. 

If anyone from the future had the ability to travel back in time and let the younger version of Zunk know about what his future would hold, he likely would’ve questioned them heavily. 

“You’re crazy,” Zunk says he would tell them. “I wish. I don’t know, I mean, I’d probably have to look into what football actually is.” 

Less than 10 years later, the Vanderbilt defensive end is 47 snaps into his third season as a consistent piece for this ascending Vanderbilt program. He’s made the big sacks before–like he did last season against Virginia Tech–he’s built up his body to fit the SEC mold. 

He’s become a veteran, even if he doesn’t feel like one. 

“This is a guy who has sneakily become one of our most reliable and consistent players,” Vanderbilt head coach Clark Lea said. “He’s made big plays for us.” 

Zunk feels as if he’s still relatively new to football–which he is compared to most of his teammates–but he’s been at it for nearly seven years since he came to America as a junior in high school to play for head coach Joe Sturdivant at Rabun Gap-Nacoochee High School. 

Sturdivant recalls being referred to “a big old tall joker” by a former teammate, but only seeing Zunk take the field in “6-man” settings. The Rabun-Gap head coach couldn’t tell much off of Zunk’s football tape, but was sold as he watched Zunk run the fastbreak, make a one-handed catch on a bad pass and fire a “perfect” bounce pass to a teammate for an open layup.

“Holy crap, this kid’s an athlete,” Sturdivant said. “His football film wasn’t great, but it’s just hard to tell what they can and can’t do off of not fully 11 man, but watching him on the basketball court I was thinking ‘man, this kid has definitely got a freakish gene in him.’”

Sturdivant–who has since departed to become the cornerbacks coach at Black Hills State University–saw enough to call and tell Zunk he could be a two-year player for him at Rabun Gap. As players showed up, he was expecting a strong 6-foot-3 kid that he could mold. When Zunk came up and introduced himself, Sturdivant didn’t recognize him. 

“Who are you,” Sturdivant said while looking up at Zunk and his unexpected 6-foot-6 frame. 

“It’s me Linus,” Zunk said.

The introduction wasn’t all that convincing, but the decision Zunk made to get to it would give him what appeared to be his best chance to follow his football dreams.

The journey from Berlin to Rabun Gap, Georgia, took Zunk over 7,000 miles and plopped him in the “middle of nowhere” after he grew up in a city with a population of 3.7 million people. Zunk learned English from elementary school on, but said that having to speak primarily in it was “definitely a transition.” 

Zunk’s biggest transition came with what appeared to be a rewind of sorts for him. The Berlin native says that in his home country he was considered to be “basically an adult” as a 16 or 17 year old. When he arrived in Georgia, he went to boarding school where he felt as if he “can’t really do anything.” 

The Vanderbilt defensive lineman is still a German citizen, but has seen his hometown and the people in it change significantly since his exit. That hasn’t worn on him as much as it did to come to terms with only seeing his grandparents twice a year when he goes home. 

“You get homesick and you miss your people,” Zunk said. “Obviously for my grandparents, it was the tough part. They’re used to their grandson living in town and coming to visit. He’s just not there anymore.” 

Perhaps the sacrifice was enough to make Zunk sit in his dorm-style room and think about what was going on back home, but it’s what he had to do in order to pursue football in the way he wanted to. 

Coming to America and playing alongside players like former Vanderbilt commit Darren Agu was the only way that Zunk was going to develop, and it appeared he needed to do plenty of development. 

“Coach, I haven’t played much football,” Sturdivant says Zunk told him. “I said ‘good, then you have no bad tendencies.’” 

Zunk trusted the plan that Sturdivant and his staff had for him, but he didn’t necessarily have a steadfast belief in himself and the football future he had ahead of him like Vanderbilt quarterback Diego Pavia and most of Zunk’s current Vanderbilt teammates did at a similar age.

The now Vanderbilt defensive end heard all types of doubt from those back home who didn’t understand his decision to pursue a football career and thought he’d be back after two years. He “didn’t blame” them for that thought, either. 

“I didn’t really know whether I was going to stay long term,” Zunk said, “Or not.” 

By the end of it, the idea that Zunk wouldn’t have a choice but to go back to Germany seemed silly at best. The Rabun Gap defensive end was a three-star prospect with four college offers and a commitment to develop at Vanderbilt. 

If paper stat sheets still ran the world, Zunk’s 2021 season–his senior year–would’ve filled up the page in black pen marks. Zunk finished with 77 tackles, 21 tackles for loss, two forced fumbles, two fumble recoveries and a blocked field goal. 

“He went from nobody knowing who he was,” Sturdivant said, “To a big-time recruit.” 

He wasn’t ready to slide into a Division-I program and receive significant playing time, though. That was a process in itself. 

“For us, it was like we had to bring it every day from the jump,” Vanderbilt defensive lineman Yilanan Ouattara–who also joined Vanderbilt as a relatively raw recruit from Germany and was Zunk’s freshman roommate–said. “I feel like we both just kept the mentality of bringing it each and every day, every game, trying to get 1% better each day. I feel like that’s something that has helped us over the years.” 

Four seasons after joining Vanderbilt’s program, Ouattara and Zunk are mainstays within its improved defensive line room and have hopes of professional football futures. 

Zunk will have to increase his presence if he’s going to take a step towards significant NFL interest, but he’s playing for more than that at this stage. The Vanderbilt defensive end knows he’s one of just a few players of his caliber to come from where he comes from. 

Perhaps some with football dreams from Zunk’s area are tempted to stay in Berlin, go through the normal high school experience and bet on their talent winning out in the end. Zunk likely isn’t opposed to the idea that those in charge will find talent, but he had to go in order to get to where he needed to get. 

“He’s shown the proper pathway,” Sturdivant said. “A lot of these guys get told ‘hey, you can just leave straight from Germany and go play college football, you don’t need to come to high school to play,’ there’s no way. The game is too dang fast and you need to come to the US and play good high school football.” 

Zunk had to sacrifice the last two years of his high school experience to do it, but his bet on himself appears to be cashing nowadays as he runs with Vanderbilt’s first-team defense and is among the German players on graphics that he likely saw pop up on his feed as a high schooler. 

When Zunk goes back home, he takes pride in being asked to speak to high school teams, sharing knowledge at his old club’s practices and being around the players that aspire to do what he’s done. He’s the example they can look to in order to see the potential path forward. 

“I love being able to support them in that way, and just being a role model, if you want to call it that,” Zunk said. “I [enjoy] showing people it’s possible.”