At 6-foot-5, Dallas Herbst has a tendency to stick out like a sore thumb from the rest of the Wisconsin wrestling team.

"Everybody thinks I play basketball," Herbst said with a grin. "But I stopped doing that a long time ago."

Instead, Herbst and his rare height are fitting in quite nicely for the No. 8 Badgers. After redshirting last year, the Winneconne native is doing his best to replace 2005 All-American Ryan Flaherty — whose season is finished due to an unspecified injury — in the team's lineup at the 197-pound weight class.

"I think Dallas has done a great job as far as stepping up and filling those shoes," UW head coach Barry Davis said. "And I think he wants to fill those shoes and he wants to be on that victory stand."

Herbst has done just that, compiling an 8-3 (including four pins) mark thus far. And he's not letting the pressure of replacing the man who led Wisconsin in wins a season ago get to him.

"Having him having an injury this year, and people are saying, 'Oh, well, this is his replacement.' Yeah, it's kind of a little bit of pressure, but I think I can live up to it," Herbst said.

Success has always come quickly for Herbst on the mat. Just ask Winneconne High head coach Don Hale, who got to watch his pupil's development first-hand.

"His freshman year he started at 152, and we didn't know exactly how good he was going to be," Hale said. "And then the next thing we know, he's qualifying for the state tournament."

But that freshman year was simply the opening chapter of one of the most decorated prep careers in Wisconsin high school history. After falling in the opening round of the state tournament as a freshman, Herbst moved up to 160 pounds and wrestled his way deep into the tournament, meeting up with a now familiar face to Wisconsin fans– Zach Hampton of the Badger football team, who was then a senior at Lancaster High School.

"It was the semifinals, and he ended up beating me 14-0," said Herbst, whose sophomore season ended with a record of 39-2. "It was probably the worst beating I've ever gotten in high school. He basically did everything I did to kids my junior and senior year to me."

Those junior and senior years included a combined perfect 85-0 record and a pair of Division II state titles at 189 pounds. That string of dominance also landed him firmly on the recruiting radar of Davis and the Wisconsin coaching staff.

"He was on there real early," Davis said. "We actually signed him in November [of 2003], so we signed him earlier than everybody else. We knew about him his junior year and going into his senior year, we knew that he was going to be a recruit for us, and we got on him early and signed him early in November."

Self-made success

Herbst says wrestling at the Division I college level has been his dream since middle school and his strong work ethic allowed him to achieve that dream.

"He's one of these kids that I didn't have to spend a lot of time with, because he had those goals set and he was going to work for those goals," Hale said.

That self-motivational quality has carried over to the college scene, where Davis says he has already established himself as a leader in just his second year on campus.

"He's the type of guy who you say things to, you say a few things to, he makes the adjustment," Davis said. "I think that's going to help him in his wrestling too come second half of the season and in his career, because he wants to learn, he's willing to learn new things and willing to do what it takes to win. And I think to really be successful at the college level, if you're self-motivated, it makes it easier to reach your accomplishments."

Taking a redshirt last season allowed Herbst to work on some of those adjustments — namely on his feet, something both he and Davis say is an ongoing process. However, wrestling unattached to a 19-2 record gave him a major boost of confidence

"Coming into it, I was thinking, 'OK, I don't know.' Kind of like when you're a freshman in high school, you don't know how you're going to do in the new levels," Herbst said. "Coming out of the year at 19-2 made me realize I could do it."

Brotherly love

One constant source of inspiration for Herbst has been his older brother, Beau — an accomplished high school wrestler in his own right. In his time at Winneconne, the elder Herbst twice qualified for the state tournament, and was ranked No. 1 in his weight class during his senior year.

"At that time he was probably the best wrestler in my school, in the history of our school," the younger Herbst said. "So it made me just want to be good. I didn't want to let my family name down I guess because he was doing so well — I didn't want to be that guy. So I worked harder just to try to be as good as him, and I guess it's helped, worked out."

Beau was also the reason Dallas got his start in wrestling — but it wasn't to follow in his big brother's footsteps oddly enough.

"My brother was actually going into some meeting about wrestling and he ended up wanting to go to Boy Scouts instead, but I told my dad I wanted to wrestle, so that's kind of how it started," Herbst said.

"A bright future"

For now, Herbst is focused on one thing and one thing only — working with Davis to improve each and every day. The focal point of those efforts is improving his skill set and becoming more aggressive off the mat.

"On my feet, I didn't take many shots in high school, so I had to learn how to do that," Herbst said. "I still need to get better on the bottom, which I need to work on."

Still, that willingness to learn and work has Davis hopeful that his young grappler will make the necessary adjustments.

"I think he has a bright future, if he continues to learn and make adjustments in his wrestling style — because I know he's self-motivated, it's not a problem," Davis said. "But at this level, to be successful, you have to make adjustments and learn new things year in and year out and put those adjustments to use, not just know that, but make them work and put them into your style. I think he's willing to do that."

And, of course, Herbst's rare size should continue to make him stand out over the next four years.

"It's definitely an advantage," Herbst said. "There are some guys that are strong and some guys who are fast. But I've just got that length that just helps me out a little bit."