Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1072455
A
s head coach at one of West Virginia's
top high school football programs, Billy
Seals is happy to see Brenton Strange
leave for Penn State.
Seals' Huntington team has played an-
nually against Parkersburg, where
Strange set records before enrolling at
PSU earlier this month. Typically, Hunt-
ington le< victorious. The Highlanders
had won eight years in a row, sometimes
by a lot. But the 2018 game was a dog-
8ght, and Strange was Seals' biggest
worry. No matter which side of the line of
scrimmage he was standing, No. 16 was
omnipresent.
"He's been di;cult to scheme against
because he brings it all," Seals said. "He
has the athleticism to make you miss, but
he's also not afraid to lower his shoulder.
You can't just put a defensive back on
him, or he'll break the tackle. But if I put
a linebacker on him, they're probably not
going to keep up."
He was a matchup nightmare, one who
grew scarier with each passing season. As
a junior, Strange scored on an 88-yard
touchdown reception in their game, set-
ting a school record. By the time he was a
senior, he had garnered enough of a rep-
utation throughout the state that Seals
was forced to game-plan around the 6-
foot-4, 214-pound athlete.
To an extent, it worked.
Huntington held Strange to 70 yards on
seven catches, an o:-day considering
that the All-State tight end averaged
more than 90 yards per game as a senior
and 14.3 yards per catch for his career.
With Huntington's defense focused on
the standout tight end, one of Strange's
teammates was able to surpass 100 re-
ceiving yards, but Huntington won in
overtime, 27-21.
Although keeping Strange out of the
end zone proved to be the di:erence, the
future Nittany Lion still caused
headaches, and not just on o:ense. He
also 8nished the game with 13 tackles and
was all over the 8eld from his outside
linebacker position.
"He's an incredible player," Seals said.
"I love his motor. He brings it every play,
on o:ense and defense. I think he's a heck
of a player on defense, and that's not even
where he's going to play in college."
Leaving Parkersburg ranked atop the
school's all-time leaderboard in 8ve sin-
gle-season or career receiving categories,
Strange has a future on o:ense at the col-
lege level. That became abundantly clear
to the Penn State coaching sta: a