All The Signs Pointed To Baylor

By Jerry Hill
Baylor Bear Insider

HOUSTON – Even though Baylor was a little to the party in the recruiting process of tight end Christoph Henle from The Oakridge School in Arlington, he couldn't avoid all the signs that "obviously Baylor was meant to be and that's where I'm supposed to end up."

Looking back on it now, he still can't believe it.

During the fall of his junior season at Oakridge, he watched a game between Cedar Hill and Bishop Gorman high schools and thought then-Cedar Hill head coach Joey McGuire was a "really cool dude . . . (that looks) like he knows what he's talking about."

Later that year, he went to New Orleans, La., to watch Tulane play Temple University and had the exact same feeling about the Temple head coach. "I just watched their head coach on the sidelines, and how he acted with the players and interacted with his other coaches. And I was like, 'Dang, that's a really cool coach.'''

Less than a month later, that Temple coach – Matt Rhule – was hired at Baylor and eventually named McGuire as his tight ends coach.

"It's crazy. I would have never thought that a coach I see at Cedar Hill would ever be my position coach in college," said the 6-foot-6, 251-pound Henle, an Innsbruck, Austria, native who came to the United States three years ago. "And I never thought I would be down in New Orleans and see Coach Rhule on the sidelines, and he would actually be my head coach one day.

"All of those were kind of signs for me that obviously Baylor was meant to be and that's where I'm supposed to end up. That's why the decision at the end was just super easy for me."

Rated the 22^nd-best tight end prospect in the nation by ESPN, Henle had offers from California, Kentucky, Houston and Illinois. But, when he made a late visit to Baylor and got a scholarship offer from Rhule, he said, "Honestly, that same night, I was like, 'Yeah, I'm probably going to end up at Baylor.'''

Able to enroll in January obviously helped, but Henle didn't even expect to play this season until a rash of injuries left him as the next man up. Playing in all 12 games and starting five, he has five catches for 47 yards going into Thursday's Texas Bowl matchup against Vanderbilt.

With projected starter Jamie Jacobs suffering a back injury that forced him to miss the entire season, Henle "had to step in," McGuire said.

"His future is so bright, but the one thing you see with Christoph is that no matter what happens, each snap he's going to step back in there and bust his butt for you," McGuire said. "You saw it coming during the camp, but you were hoping that he would kind of grow into a player instead of being forced into a player."

Rhule says that he forgets sometimes that Henle is actually a true freshman and not a proven upperclassman.

"He's really developed as a player over the course of the year," Rhule said. "And I think a large part of that is (senior defensive end) Greg Roberts going against him daily in practice has really helped him. It's a tough stretch, we've played some really good teams, and every week he gets a little bit better. Now, as he comes into this bowl game, he's a vet. And as he moves into next season, he'll certainly be a vet. It wasn't too long ago that he was in high school, and here he is."

It wasn't that long ago that he was still in Innsbruck, snow skiing and playing soccer as the only child of Wolfgang and Gudrun Henle.

Christoph said he was "always a little chippy" and "the roughest one on the team" in soccer. So, at 11 years old, he quit soccer and started playing American football at a time when several club teams started popping up in Austria.

"A club in my town opened up, and I decided I would try it," he said. "The next day, I went to practice and loved it, and I've been playing it ever since."

While it's not on the same level as high school football in Texas, Henle's Swarco Raiders club team came to Texas when he was in seventh grade and beat a middle-school all-star team from Houston. "So, I guess the standard is pretty good in Austria," he said.

Knowing that Christoph wanted to come to the U.S. to play football, Swarco Raiders club coach Florian Grein got him in touch with Oakridge coach Phillip Farhat. "One thing led to another, and he found me a great host family, and that's how I ended up here," he said.

Rusty and Audrey Stehr and their daughters, Olivia and Megan, "welcomed me with open arms and were super supportive with school, and they gave me a home," Christoph said.

"I still have my own room," he said. "I think it was really exciting for Rusty to have a son. Obviously, he loves his two daughters, but I guess it's a little different having an older kid. I'm a single child, so it was awesome to have two siblings for a little while. It's crazy how big they are now."

Playing the role of the protective older brother, Christoph says, "Boys, stay away."

When he signed with Baylor last December, Audrey Stehr said, "From the first time we met you at the airport, I have not regretted one day that we welcomed you into our home. You have been so respectful, loving, kind and a huge big brother to our girls. God has just given you a huge opportunity, and we're so thankful for that."

Although they are University of Oklahoma graduates, the Stehrs were both decked out in green and gold when the Bears played the Sooners this fall in Norman.

"They didn't quite know what to say, but now they're huge Baylor fans," Christoph said. "I was kind of shocked when they went to the OU game and they were wearing Baylor stuff. That was awesome for me."

Three years ago, when he first came to the U.S., Christoph was in the record crowd of 71,307 at NRG Stadium that watched game MVP Leonard Fournette and 22^nd-ranked LSU defeat Texas Tech, 56-27, in the Texas Bowl.

Now, he gets to finish his freshman season at Baylor playing Vanderbilt in the Academy Sports + Outdoors Texas Bowl in the same stadium.

"That was the second college game I had ever watched," he said. "It was just so cool for me to be there. I was a little kid watching that game. I was super excited, and I thought how cool it was to get to watch the game. Now, I get to play in the bowl game. It's a dream come true for me."

One other sign that he was destined to end up at Baylor came years ago when he was playing the Madden NFL video game for the first time.

"I had absolutely no idea what to pick, what's good, what's bad, how to play it," he said. "I chose, literally, a random team, and it was the Washington Redskins. Funny enough, two years later they draft RG3 (Robert Griffin III). And that's when I first heard about Baylor. That was also kind of crazy for me that a guy that I bought a jersey from actually went to the school that I go to now.

"All these signs just told me that obviously Baylor is meant to be for me and it's the right fit and the right choice."

All The Signs Pointed To Baylor

Players Mentioned

Christoph Henle

Jamie Jacobs

Greg Roberts

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