Brian Farkas has a new jersey number … and a new position … and a new sport.

The newest member of the SMU football team also is the most recent member of the SMU men’s soccer team. After spending a couple of years battling a crowded group of forwards on the soccer team, Farkas saw that the battle for playing time would be an uphill climb, so he is going back to what he called the other sport he has “always loved.”

Former SMU soccer player Brian Farkas is wearing jersey No. 25 in his new role as a walk-on kicker and punter on the SMU football team (photo by SMU athletics).

Farkas is walking on this spring with the football team, trying to make the roster as a kicker and/or punter.

It won’t be the first time for Farkas, who kicked and punted in his first two years at Plano West High School.

“I gave up football when I aggravated a bone in my back — I think it was the L-5 (lumbar 5),” he said. “It’s down near the tailbone.”

In his final two years of high school, Farkas focused on soccer, and had his heart set on playing for SMU.

“It was always a dream, coming to play here,” Farkas said. “You grow up in this area, you want to play at SMU, or at least I did. I wanted to come here, because of (then-head coach) Schellas Hyndman and his reputation.”

Farkas got that chance when he signed with the Ponies in 2008. Shortly thereafter, however, Hyndman resigned the position he had held for 24 years to take over as head coach of Major League Soccer’s FC Dallas.

“I’ve always loved football,” Farkas said when asked about the timing of his switch. “Soccer wasn’t working out — there are a lot of guys at my position, and a lot of them are really good, so I thought I’d try this.”

Farkas sought out offensive lineman Blake McJunkin, who he knew as a crosstown rival in high school (McJunkin played at Plano Senior High). McJunkin got him in contact with SMU director of football operations Randy Ross, who then directed him to special teams coach Dennis McKnight. Farkas was given a tryout, in which he kicked field goals, kicked off and punted.

The motions of kicking a soccer ball and kicking and punting a football are different; Farkas said making the adjustment hasn’t been hard, since he has kicked both for years. Farkas says as a placekicker, he is “very consistent” on field goals of up to 35 yards, and has a career long of 55 yards. As a punter, he says he “turns the ball over,” which allows the nose of the ball to come down first, adding height and distance to punts.

He has been with the football team for just a few days, but Farkas said the feedback he has gotten about his performance so far has been good, but that he has been assured of nothing after spring workouts finish up April 24.

“(The coaches) have told me I’m doing well,” he said. “They said they like how I’m kicking, and that I’m getting a high trajectory. They said I’m added to the roster for the spring, so far, and they’ll evaluate me again at the end of the spring.”

When he told men’s soccer head coach Tim McClements of his decision to switch sports, Farkas said his coach was nothing but encouraging.

“He totally supports my decision,” Farkas said. “I told him I wanted to go on a different path, and he was OK with that, and assured me that I’ll always be a part of the SMU soccer family, too.”

Farkas, who will be a junior academically but just a sophomore athletically in the fall, said he knows just making the SMU roster will be an uphill battle; the Ponies have Matt Szymanski entrenched as the starting kicker and punter, and heralded freshman Mike Loftus waiting his turn.

“Right now, I just hope to be on the team in the fall,” Farkas said. “I know Matt was the starter last year, and I’m looking up to him. I want to do whatever it takes to get to where Matt is now. That’s the goal for all of us.”