 The following year, as a redshirt freshman, he played a few snaps as a tight end and on the kickoff return team, as well as serving as the team's backup long snapper; at the end of the 2000 season, he was picked for the Academic All-Big 12 second team.He progressed to the Academic All-Big 12 first team for the only time in 2001, after playing in all 13 of the Longhorns' games, exclusively as the long snapper on punts.An ankle injury meant Loeffler missed the Longhorns' games against Houston and Tulane in 2002, but he finally took over long snapping duties for field goals and PATs for the last seven games of the season and was the team's Special Teams Player of the Week in week 2 for his two solo tackles against North Carolina.