Adam Rittenberg
Multiple Authors
IOWA CITY, Iowa — Gennings Dunker folded his 6-foot-5, 319-pound body right into a sales space at Culver’s, overlooking a Midwestern feast match for a mulleted king. At the heart, in fact, had been cheese curds. A family-sized order, all to himself.
Dunker had visited this Culver’s earlier than, often after Iowa house video games, performed a few mile away at Kinnick Stadium. The Hawkeyes’ beginning proper sort out would search an informal, acquainted place to dine along with his dad and mom and brothers. For the Dunkers, who went to Culver’s after church again house, no different spot supplied higher consolation meals.
“It’s awesome to come here, because you didn’t have to make reservations,” Gennings mentioned.
Back then, simply months in the past, Dunker might go largely unnoticed at Culver’s. Not anymore. He had barely sat down final week when a bunch of children requested to take an image with him. Others wished him luck as they handed by.
A person carrying a Chicago Cubs hat and hoodie approached.
“I don’t know you, but I love your memes on the internet,” he mentioned. “F—ing great!”
The memes have modified every thing for Dunker. He’s a projected Day 2 NFL draft decide — ESPN’s Mel Kiper Jr. lists him as the No. 7 tackle. Few prospects, nonetheless, have flooded social media extra throughout the draft lead-up, particularly at the mix in Indianapolis, the place the soccer world was launched to the large man from a small Illinois city, with a flowing purple mullet, a thick mustache and the persona to match.
Jason and Travis Kelce had been so smitten with Dunker during their podcast that when Jason likened Dunker’s predraft show to a Westminster Kennel Club-like “best in show” for offensive linemen, Travis fell out of his chair. A widely circulated meme featured Dunker’s 40-yard sprint at the mix in slo-mo — mullet bouncing with each stride, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s “Free Bird” taking part in and the accompanying caption: “Peak Male Performance.” Esquire posted that Dunker gained the mix “on looks alone.”
Dunker left Indy as a full-blown superstar.
“When I was going through [Chicago’s] O’Hare Airport after the combine, people would come up to me,” Dunker mentioned. “I was like: What is going on?”
One of Dunker’s viral predraft moments concerned Culver’s. While reviewing his huge meals consumption with the NFL Network crew at the Senior Bowl, Dunker famous that he included Culver’s along with his dietician’s listing.
“What’s Culver’s?” requested NFL Network insider Mike Garafolo.
“You’ve never been to Culver’s?” an incredulous Dunker replied, whereas Garafolo’s colleague Tom Pelissero defined that he isn’t from the Midwest.
“That’s a crime. Are you serious?” Dunker continued. “That ain’t right. You’ve got to check it out.”
Culver’s is a part of Dunker’s journey, however there’s extra to him than curds and a particular hairstyle. Beneath the mullet is an ever-curious thoughts that consumes the finer factors of soccer and life past the area. Dunker is an avid reader and outdoorsman, the kind who appreciates a sundown over Storm Lake in Iowa and fishing spot simply as a lot as writing chemistry equations in his basement.
He’s additionally fiercely team-oriented, a part of an Iowa offensive line that gained the 2025 Joe Moore Award as the nation’s finest. He’s the first to say, “We play five as one,” and confirmed as much as an ESPN picture shoot carrying a T-shirt displaying the face of linemate Lucas Allgeyer.
But the predraft interval has revealed one thing else: Gennings Michael Dunker is considered one of one.
“Football’s played in helmets, it’s played in pads, but the story of Gennings Dunker has certainly benefited with the helmet being off,” mentioned Iowa assistant defensive coordinator Seth Wallace, who found Dunker in tiny Lena, Illinois. “The things without his helmet on have given him an opportunity to present himself to the public, to NFL executives, general managers, coaches.
“They’re all discovering out: This child’s a hell of a soccer participant, however gosh, he has an infectious persona.”
LET’S BEGIN WITH the mullet and the mustache, because each has a story of its own. The mustache, like Dunker’s football skills, needed nourishment.
“I had it after I was like 16, and it didn’t look good,” he explained. “I could not even actually develop hair until I used to be 20. Like, I did not have chest hair, barely had armpit hair.”
Dunker would not shave, no matter how silly he looked, and eventually, the stache filled in. The mullet, meanwhile, was a “case examine,” borrowed from fellow Iowa offensive lineman Connor Colby, now with the San Francisco 49ers.
Colby grew his own mullet at Iowa in 2021, earning freshman All-America honors as a starting guard. He then cut it during the middle part of his Hawkeyes career, and his performance — and the line’s — began to slip. Colby brought back the mullet in 2024, this time with Dunker growing one too. They helped revive Iowa’s line performance that fall, and Colby earned first-team All-Big Ten honors before becoming a seventh-round draft pick of the 49ers. Might as well keep it, Dunker thought to himself.
The cut has gone over relatively well in his family, although his mother, Michelle, from whom Gennings gets his ginger locks, isn’t a huge mullet fan.
“She at all times wished a daughter, so she might have seen what the daughter would have seemed like,” Gennings said.
Tattoos of Biblical figures line Dunker’s shoulders and chest: Samson, King David and Moses. His favorite is Moses and the Burning Bush, displayed on his left bicep.
“It’s type of like, God’s calling to your life, exit for journey,” he said. “It’s how you discover objective in life. Football’s type of an journey. Doing something actually onerous is type of an journey. That’s why I prefer it.”
Dunker’s football adventure is a familiar one at Iowa: small-town kid who needed time to develop and emerged as a draftable prospect. He came in raw after losing his final high school season to COVID-19 then missed his freshman year at Iowa after foot surgery.
The other linemen in his class had, in his view, more athleticism, talent and polish.
“It was a giant leap,” he mentioned.
In 2022, Dunker had 11 appearances and earned his first begin in Iowa’s bowl win. He grew to become a full-time starter in 2023, incomes honorable point out all-league honors, however Iowa’s offense remained in a historic gap.
“He was going to be part of the solution,” Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz mentioned.
Dunker did not actually really feel comfy till his fourth 12 months. He remained the beginning proper sort out, was a second-team All-Big Ten choice and helped block for a top-25 speeding offense. His expectations had already been far exceeded, particularly as a lifelong Iowa fan who had idolized Ferentz.
The risk of an NFL profession nonetheless wasn’t actual to Dunker, till his end-of-season assembly with offensive line coach George Barnett, who knowledgeable him he might play in the professionals.
“Everyone in this football facility knew it before Dunker knew it, which is the cool thing,” offensive sort out Trevor Lauck mentioned. “We all saw it in him. Just his stature alone, how big he is, how much he lifts, he’s quick, he cares a lot, obviously. He wouldn’t doubt himself, but he’d say, ‘Yeah, I don’t know.’ And then we’d watch his film and we’re like, ‘Bro, what are you talking about? You keep this up, you’re going to be great.'”
Last 12 months, Dunker and Lauck bookended a line the place all 5 starters earned All-Big Ten honors, together with Dunker, a first-team choice by the media. Ferentz, who lower his tooth teaching O-line, expects Dunker to start out his professional profession at guard with the potential to additionally play sort out.
“He wants to block the guy he’s supposed to block,” Ferentz mentioned. “As stupid as that sounds, as simple as that sounds, it’s a big part of being a good player. He’s always trying to do his job really well. He’s got all the attributes it takes to be successful.”
Many of these traits had been formed again house in Lena.
BEFORE THE MULLET got here the mop high. Dunker wore it round Lena, his hometown of round 2,700, tucked in Illinois’ northeast nook, close to the Iowa and Wisconsin borders.
“He had this huge mop of red hair, like the Justin Bieber haircut,” mentioned Gannon, his youngest brother.
“You just had to evolve from that,” added Dunker’s different brother, Gage.
Gennings, Gage and Gannon all had been born in Des Moines, Iowa, however moved to Lena when Gennings was 8. Michelle, a bodily therapist, had landed a job with a neighborhood hospital community. Their father, Mike, labored for Nationwide, which wished somebody in the space to promote farm insurance coverage.
Mike and Michelle each had grown up in Iowa, not removed from Iowa City — Mike in Wilton, Michelle in Muscatine — and appreciated the concept of elevating their younger household in a small city.
Gennings spent a lot of his childhood exterior, using his bike with pals, taking part in all the sports activities and making forts in his yard. Other than some Halo 4, display time was restricted.
“It sounds like ‘Leave it to Beaver,’ but that’s what it was,” Mike mentioned.
Sports had been central to life in Lena, particularly soccer. The Dunker boys spent Friday nights in the fall watching — and later taking part in — video games at Lena-Winslow High School, often known as Le-Win, beneath coach Ric Arand, who’s in the Illinois High School Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame.
“Everybody kind of lives and breathes for the football team,” Gannon mentioned. “Not like Odessa in ‘Friday Night Lights,’ but whenever I watch that movie, I get flashbacks.”
Gennings took to sports activities, primarily due to his measurement, but additionally discovered different methods to compete. He thrived in the accelerated studying (AR) program in Lena faculties, which awarded college students factors for books they completed.
One e-book equaled 12 or 13 factors. Gennings, who cherished Harry Potter and different fantasy collection, piled up round 1,200.
“I don’t know if anyone else wanted to read, but I was like, ‘Screw it, let’s see how many points I can get,'” he mentioned. “I would try to read a book every day. I would be up late in my room, my parents thought I’m asleep and I’m just reading.”
Dunker was identified for his athletic prowess and intelligence, however he additionally frolicked with a crowd who “loved a lot of fun,” mentioned Mark Kuehl, then the principal at Le-Win. For the senior prank on the final day of highschool, Dunker corralled geese from a good friend’s household farm and launched them throughout first interval.
One ended up at Kuehl’s desk.
“I didn’t know anything and I’m wandering around like I always did, and all of a sudden, here come these ducks down the hall,” Kuehl mentioned. “[Dunker] was around the corner. I didn’t think for sure it was him, and he goes, ‘Yeah, it was me.'”
Kuehl had a number of guidelines with senior pranks: Nothing damaged or ruined, and no further work for the custodians.
“They were s—ting all over the school,” Gage mentioned. “He just made Gennings clean up the s— and he was fine.”
Life in Lena wasn’t all enjoyable and video games. Gennings additionally realized learn how to work, first baling hay for eight- or nine-hour shifts at native farms, then as a dishwasher and meals runner at The Rafters, now Lena Brewing Company. Mike and the restaurant’s proprietor, Ross Vehmeier, lifted weights collectively, and Mike would ship all three of his sons to work there, beginning with Gennings.
“I don’t know if child labor laws are a real thing in small towns, which is awesome,” Gennings mentioned.
Vehmeier did not rent employees beneath 16, which he assumed Gennings was after taking a look at the towering teen. Then, one evening after a shift at The Rafters, Gennings stood exterior with a few of the employees, when Michelle drove by to choose him up.
“The chefs are giving him grief, like, ‘Hey, what’s the deal? Why aren’t you driving? You don’t have a license?'” Vehmeier mentioned. “He goes, ‘No, I’m only 14.’ We got this 14-year-old kid working for us that looks like he’s 20, got these big feet. I guess the rest is history.”
Gennings cherished every thing about the job. On the first day of sophomore 12 months at the highschool, he took an image holding an indication that listed “Rafters Cheeseburger” as his favourite meals and “Lead Dishwasher” as what he wished to be when he grew up.
Dunker already had the rising half coated. The cheeseburgers helped him get nearer to the profession he ended up pursuing.
“That’s why he’s so big,” Gage mentioned. “They would make him two meals in a six-hour shift, and he’d eat it all.”
WALLACE HAS RECRUITED the Chicago suburbs for years. He often takes Interstate 88 house — a straight shot to Iowa City — however at instances he’ll drive alongside U.S. Route 20, the nation’s longest highway, which cuts throughout the northern ridge of Illinois, via Lena.
“Much more scenic,” Wallace mentioned.
He had another excuse, too. Arand had constructed Lena-Winslow right into a heavyweight in Illinois’ small-school division, profitable seven Class 1A state titles since 2010, together with 4 from 2017 to 2022.
His success intrigued Wallace, who tried to “get off the beaten path” in recruiting.
“It’s not heavy-trafficked,” Wallace mentioned. “It’s not one of the first 100 schools you’re going to go to in the state of Illinois to find a prospect.”
Iowa hadn’t recruited Le-Win’s gamers till defensive lineman Isaiah Bruce, a 12 months forward of Dunker, who dedicated to Iowa in November 2018. Wallace visited Bruce at the highschool and introduced alongside Hawkeyes coach Kirk Ferentz. While Ferentz met with Bruce, Wallace and Arand stood in the lobby exterior the faculty cafeteria.
Dunker, who, in keeping with Arand, “has got a question for everything,” walked out of the cafeteria towards his coach, carrying vivid purple sneakers. He had come to Le-Win at solely 190 kilos — “A big, redheaded, kind of gawky kid,” Arand mentioned — and was nonetheless including mass: 30-40 kilos throughout his sophomore 12 months, one other 20-30 the following summer season.
“Gennings wore 17½, 18 [size] shoes, so they stuck out like a sore thumb, like Ronald McDonald shoes,” Arand mentioned. “Coach Wallace and I were standing there talking, and he looks down at his feet and looks up at Gennings.”
Wallace prolonged his hand.
“My name is Seth Wallace. What’s your name?
“Gennings Dunker.”
Wallace thought to himself: Holy s—, this is a mountain of a man. He asked Dunker about his shoe size, as well as his height and weight.
Soon enough, Ferentz came over and met the gangly ginger with the giant red shoes.
“I virtually peed my pants,” Dunker said. “You grew up watching Kirk Ferentz, and now he is in my faculty. I used to be like, ‘What the heck? This is wild.’ I believe I blacked out.”
Dunker began attending Iowa’s football camps. The coaches’ interest in Dunker grew and grew.
After a camp, Ferentz brought Dunker, his parents and brothers to his office. He offered Gennings a scholarship. Gennings, who had been photographed wearing matching Hawkeyes shirts with his brothers in 2010, committed on the spot.
“It was a cool drive house,” Gennings said. “I do not even know if I did that effectively at that camp. I’d by no means pass-set. I believe I attempted to run block on pass-set, however they most likely appreciated that.”
He became the first pledge of the Hawkeyes’ 2021 recruiting class.
“I at all times inform folks: We needed to transfer to Illinois for our child to grow to be a Hawkeye,” Mike mentioned.
BEFORE WALLACE AND Ferentz came to Le-Win, Dunker wasn’t even sure he’d go to college. He had a good GPA but “took lots of store courses.”
But coming to Iowa accelerated Dunker’s natural curiosity, especially during a chemistry course.
“I acquired an A-minus and I used to be type of amazed, like, ‘No method,'” he said. “I used to be like, ‘Screw it, let’s attempt to be pre-med.'”
He liked the competition of the pre-med track, and also helping people. A health and human physiology major, he spent two years working at a bone growth research lab at Iowa, and volunteered during the summers in the respiratory unit at the university’s hospital.
Chemistry hooked him.
“I by no means thought I would really like chemistry, like, natural chemistry,” he said. “It type of tickled me, I cherished it. It’s type of an enormous puzzle.”
Dunker went to Home Depot and bought 148 ft of whiteboard, putting it round the basement of his off-campus house. Offensive linemate Cael Winter joked it was “a serial killer’s basement,” but Dunker would invite over other students — athletes and non-athletes — to fill the boards with equations. Dunker has never seen “Good Will Hunting,” but Wallace describes the lineman as “depraved good.”
Dunker was also the “glue man” of Iowa’s offensive line room, Lauck said, holding slackers accountable while also boosting teammates’ confidence and always injecting some humor. He loved the line’s Thursday dinners and their summer trip to the Ozarks. Like other Iowa players, Dunker participated in the hay bale toss at Beef Days every July in nearby Solon. Not surprisingly, the farmhand from Lena won titles in 2022 and 2023.
Whenever Dunker sees Lauck, he does a karate kick because he thinks his friend resembles Po from “Kung Fu Panda.”
“He says I’ve massive cheeks, like on my face,” Lauck said. “I’m like, ‘Thanks, I suppose. I do not know learn how to reply.’ It’s fairly random. That has been operating for shut to 2 years now, and it at all times will get me going.
“There weren’t really any bad days when he’s in the room.”
Since the mix, Dunker has been coaching in Iowa City, whereas attending Hawkeyes spring soccer practices. When the O-line has an odd variety of gamers, Dunker pulls apart a younger man and works with him (regardless of his pre-med observe, he is now fascinated about teaching highschool soccer when he is completed taking part in).
Dunker reveals as much as assist the staff he loves, however he rapidly turns into the focus.
“We’ve got mothers, we’ve got sisters, we’ve got prospects that, if Gennings Dunker’s in the building, they all want to meet him, and they all want to get their picture with him,” Wallace mentioned.
Dunker is not totally comfy along with his fame. He has been ready to be a part of one other staff, to bond with linemates and a quarterback, to be considered one of 5 once more. In about 10 days, he’ll know the place he is going.
Dunker will likely be again in Lena for draft weekend. Only one venue made sense to host his draft occasion, the previous Rafters. Vehmeier has already ordered purple mullets and plans to promote them, with proceeds going to the Lena sports activities program, an concept Gennings instantly permitted.
“Every time you see his name listed in anything, it’s going to say Lena, so it’s big for our community, huge,” Kuehl mentioned. “He could be a great football player and a terrible person, and that’s not him. Just a great guy.”
As the draft nears, Dunker is doubling down on the values that formed him, particularly self-belief, which he did not at all times have in soccer, but additionally curiosity and treating others effectively.
And when you can develop a mullet, let it move.
“All football players are hidden by the helmet, but especially O-linemen,” Lauck mentioned. “So it was cool when he got to take the helmet off, people got to see him and his hair and his mustache and they’re like, ‘Oh, this guy’s pretty interesting.’
“I’m glad it has labored out the method it has.”
