Blue White Illustrated

TRIED AND TRUE C O V E R S T O R Y A contingent of true freshmen headlined by RB Keyvone Lee and WR Parker Washington were called on to provide a spark, and they delivered for the Lions in their first season on campus year ago, at the start of the De- cember signing period for the Class of 2020, James Franklin was asked about the running backs he had just landed, Keyvone Lee and Caziah Holmes. Both were from Florida, both had received four-star ratings from Rivals.com, and both were heading into a situation at Penn State in which it seemed likely that their glitter- ing high school resumes weren't going to translate into ample playing time, at least not right away. Penn State already had three former four- star running backs on its roster in Noah Cain, Devyn Ford and Ricky Slade, and the one running back who hadn't joined the Nittany Lions amid an outburst of recruit- ing fanfare – Journey Brown – was only a week away from gashing Memphis for 202 yards in the Cotton Bowl. So the backfield that Lee and Holmes had just agreed to join was overstuffed with talent, meaning that the two true freshmen were going to have to work relentlessly for every carry they got during the 2020 season. That was fine with Franklin. More than fine, actually. When the veteran Penn State coach goes recruiting, he's looking for guys who want to work relent- lessly for carries, catches, tackles and sacks. As far as he's concerned, having an overstuffed depth chart is a feature, not a bug. Besides being one of the most impor- tant ingredients in any team's on-field suc- cess, it's a window into the ambitions of potential recruits. In the case of Lee and Holmes, that window illuminated just what Franklin wanted to see. The willingness of the two coveted running backs to step into a highly competitive environment, one in which they weren't assured of anything ex- cept for a chance to show off their poten- tial, was in itself a sign that they were the kind of players he wanted in his program. "I love when guys never ask you about the depth chart during the recruiting process," Franklin said. "I'm not saying it's a negative when people do ask about it, but my point is that guys understand, if you're going to go to a school where you want to compete at the highest level for confer- ence championships, for na- tional championships and all those types of things, you're going to have to compete wherever you go. The top pro- grams are recruiting the best players in the country year | STRONG START Lee came up big for Penn State at Michigan, rushing for 134 yards and winning Big Ten Freshman of the Week honors in a 27-17 PSU victory. Photo by courtesy of Penn State Ath- letics A

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