Blue White Illustrated

P E N N S T A T E F O O T B A L L >> ing behind a younger running back in 2018, as four-star freshman Ricky Slade leaped past him into the backup role be- hind starter Miles Sanders. Two years into his college career, Brown wasn't on the fast track that he had hoped would lead to more playing time, and he knew that it was his mental outlook that was holding him back. Eventually, that outlook changed. But it wasn't the arrangement of the depth chart that caused him to re-examine his approach to the game. It was a personal loss – the death of his grandmother. "When she passed away, I re- ally locked in," Brown said. "Everything I did was for my grandma, so I guess you could say when she passed away, I was like, 'What am I doing? Who do I want to be with this?' I would always hear her voice in my head, and I started to learn how to be confident in myself, because she al- ways gave me that confidence." As he prepares for his redshirt sopho- more season at Penn State, Brown has used that newfound confidence to regain the momentum that had dissipated while he was waiting his turn behind Saquon Barkley and Sanders. He's listed at 206 pounds this spring, 12 pounds above his weight when he arrived at PSU, and yet he's still blazing fast. He's also developed a better under- standing of the full range of his responsi- bilities in the Lions' offense. The key, he said, is that he's figured out how to com- partmentalize. That's meant "separating my off-the-field stuff and not letting it mess up my brain on the field so that I can focus on one thing and not try to eat an elephant in one bite, [but instead] kind of chop it up in pieces." Coaches and teammates have praised Brown's development this spring, citing him as one of the foremost members of a group of underclassmen who are set to make a big impact in 2019. "There are a lot of things going right for Journey right now," coach James Franklin said. "He's confident, he's becoming a leader, he's had an unbelievable off-sea- son. He's always been extremely gifted. Last year he ran a 4.3 for us and pulled his hamstring while running the 40 and missed a lot of spring ball because of it. But the light seems to be coming on for him. It's never been a physical thing. It's been a confidence thing, an assignment thing – not only with our offense but also with defensive recognition for blitz pickup and things like that. He's doing some really nice things." Added running backs coach Ja'Juan Sei- der, "Journey has really been a pleasant surprise. He's taken the next step. He can make us different. His speed is game- changing. When he learns to trust himself as a player, he can be special." Brown's ascent is likely to be a key factor in Penn State's efforts to remake its back- field following the loss of last year's top two rushers, Sanders and Trace McSorley. Those two combined to gain 2,072 yards last season, 78 percent of the team's total of 2,664 rushing yards. They also scored 21 of the Nittany Lions' 34 rushing touch- downs. It's unlikely that the Lions' next quar- terback will be as productive on the ground as McSorley, whose 1,697 career rushing yards are the most by a QB in the program's history. But they will undoubt- edly be looking for their running backs to approximate Sanders' numbers, and maybe even improve on them given the VERSATILE PLAYER Slade is looking to be an all-purpose threat in Penn State's backfield this year. He caught two passes for 20 yards in the Blue- White Game. Photo by Steve Manuel

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