Reusse: Gophers tight end pushes himself to the 'Maxx'

Maxx Williams and Zack Goetz were cousins of the same age and living in the same area. They were enthused from childhood about becoming football players.

Ron Goetz was Zack's father and Maxx's uncle. He had been a linebacker for the Gophers, a draft choice of the Vikings, a player in the Canadian Football League and for the Barcelona Dragons in Mike Lynn's World League of American Football.

Goetz spent considerable time throwing a football to Maxx and Zack. And Uncle Ron had quite a smile as Maxx, now a Gophers tight end, made a reception for the ages along a TCF Bank Stadium sideline in Saturday's 51-14 rout of Iowa.

"Zack and Maxx were 7, 8 years old, and we would put up cones and run some drills," Goetz said. "I'd throw passes so they would have to run to the sideline and say, 'This is college. You have to get one foot in.'

"They would try to do whatever it took to tap that toe before they went out of bounds."

This was not to say that Uncle Ron's football advice to Maxx was always the most astute.

"When Maxx was headed to the Gophers, I said, 'You have to be a defensive end; your future's there,' " Goetz said. "Shows how smart I am."

Maxx was raised in Waconia, with longtime NFLer Brian Williams and Rochele as his parents. Rochele was one of Ron Goetz's four sisters, and I guess that makes it OK for Ron to refer to her as the "toughest chick" he ever saw as an athlete.

"Rochele did great in school, too … unlike her brother," Goetz said. "She won some big academic award."

Rochele Goetz was a volleyball player for the Gophers from 1984-87. She was a Minnesota recipient (one man, one woman) for the 1988 Conference Medal of Honor for athletic and academic excellence.

The late Dr. Robert Williams, Maxx's paternal grandfather, was Notre Dame's quarterback in the late '50s. Brian Williams was a 215-pound lineman when recruited from Mount Lebanon, Pa., to Minnesota by Lou Holtz in the mid-'80s. He grew into an NFL first-rounder and played for the Giants from 1989-99, dealing with injuries in the first half of that career.

Maxx's maternal grandmother is Donna Moonen, the mother of Ron, Rochele and three other daughters.

Maxx was a strapping lad at Waconia High as a sophomore when he caught the attention of the Gophers and Iowa. He was impressed with Kirk Ferentz and the Iowa program, but Dad was a Gopher, Mom was a Gopher and Uncle Ron was a Gopher. Throw in Jerry Kill and the new coaching staff and Maxx committed to Minnesota as a Waconia junior.

"He's a great player, great athlete, and the biggest thing is he's put on weight," Kill said this week. "I think Maxx weighed 200 pounds, and played quarterback in high school."

Two hundred? I don't know. I saw him play quarterback for Waconia against Mankato West in the 2011 playoffs, and even though West won the game, Williams already looked like a beast of a football player.

Williams was asked this week if any schools talked to him about playing quarterback. He laughed and said, "I threw about five passes a game, and they weren't always the best."

Many people saw Williams as a defensive end or linebacker, but he said Kill's staff told him from the get-go that he would be a tight end.

Offensive coordinator Matt Limegrover was asked if he thought Williams' sideline catch was possible and he said: "Oh, absolutely. I never doubt Maxx … honestly, I didn't have any doubt he was going to catch it. I mean, he just does things."

He's done enough things — 22 catches, 326 yards, seven touchdowns with a run-heavy offense — to be very much in focus for NFL teams as a draft-eligible, third-year sophomore. That decision is months away.

"Maxx is thinking about one thing right now: Ohio State," Ron Goetz said. "He always wanted to be first: first to catch it, to tackle it, to recover it. He's had that competitiveness since he was a little kid."