Blue White Illustrated

KEY PERSONNEL Noah Cain*, Devyn Ford*, Caziah Holmes, Keyvone Lee*, John Lovett, Tank Smith LOSS Journey Brown RISING STAR Almost everyone in the Nittany Lions' running backs room could &t this description. Even Cain, the player who is viewed by many as the mainstay of the Penn State back&eld this year, has only played in 11 games to date, rushing for 456 yards on 87 carries. Per- haps the player most deserving of the "ris- ing star" designation is Lovett. He's al- ready displayed some star power, just not at Penn State. The Burlington, N.J., native led Baylor in rushing during his sophomore and jun- ior seasons but opted to &nish his colle- giate career elsewhere aer a 2020 season in which he totaled only 45 car- ries for 130 yards. He's now competing with some very talented players, but running backs coach Ja'Juan Seider said Lovett has one advantage in that he's fa- miliar with the Big 12-style oense that new coordinator Mike Yurcich is build- ing at PSU. BIGGEST LOSS There was only one loss here, and the Nittany Lions have had ample time to adapt. Coming o a Cot- ton Bowl performance against Memphis in which he rushed for a Penn State postseason-record 202 yards, Brown had been set to play a starring role in the team's fortunes in 2020. But prior to the start of the season, doctors discovered that he had a heart condition called hy- pertrophic cardiomyopathy, and the di- agnosis brought an end to his playing career. Cain started the opener at Indi- ana in his absence, only to suer a sea- son-ending injury three carries into his sophomore campaign. Ford went on to start &ve of PSU's remaining games, while Lee started the other three. NUMBERS GAME If he's healthy, Cain will be the favorite to start for Penn State coming out of preseason camp. But the redshirt sophomore has fewer career carries than Lovett (355), Ford (119) and Lee (89). OUTLOOK No matter how last season played out, the Nittany Lions would al- most certainly have found themselves with a competition for the starting RB spot this summer. Given how it did play out, with Ford, Lee and Holmes pressed into emergency duty following the sud- den loss of Brown and Cain, several of the contenders for prime spots in this year's running back rotation have al- ready gotten extended opportunities to show what they can do. That bodes well for Lee. He was Penn State's most eective runner in the sec- ond half of the 2020 season, gaining 345 of his team-high 438 rushing yards in the &nal four games. Lee is listed at 220 pounds this summer, a substantial change from his listed weight of 230 last year. But he said recently that his actual weight is about 228 pounds, so it hasn't State's first offensive series of the season at Indiana. Players learned at halftime in Bloomington that Cain was done for the afternoon. What they didn't know at the time, but would soon find out, was that he was also done for the season. The loss of Brown and Cain propelled Ford to the starting lineup, but Lee un- derstood that his outlook had changed, too. "Devyn can't play all the snaps – that's how I was looking at it," he said. "I was a little nervous. But at the same time, it's just football, so I wasn't too nervous." Running backs coach Ja'Juan Seider prefers to keep newcomers shielded from that kind of pressure, partly because they need time to acclimate to college life, but also because players often assume they'll be able to ease into prominent roles and don't always respond well when it doesn't work out that way. "They're all highly recruited and they think it's going to be easy," Seider said. "You come into a room where there are some athletes. You weren't expecting to play, and all of a sudden your number is called. Now, not only do you have to play, but you have to be the guy." That's what happened to Penn State's freshman running backs last year. But as it turned out, they were ready for their mo- ment, and that was because they had bought into another of Seider's beliefs: Everyone needs to be prepared for every- thing at all times. Said Lee, "He just always told all of us to be ready. You never know what's going to happen. I was prepared on day one, even if I wasn't going to play." Lee is even better prepared going into his sophomore season. He's a little bit lighter than last year, and a little bit faster, too. Although he's currently listed at 220 pounds on the PSU roster, he said his true weight as of early June was closer to 228, a few pounds less than his listed weight as * Starting experience at PSU in 2020 >> RUNNING BACK NO NAME HT WT YEAR 21 Noah Cain 5-10 237 Jr./Jr. 24 Keyvone Lee 6-0 228 So./So. 28 Devyn Ford 5-11 200 Jr./Jr. 26 Caziah Holmes 5-11 209 So./So. 23 John Lovett 6-0 210 Sr./Sr. LOVETT OR OR OR OR Backfield shaping up to be a strength P O S I T I O N B R E A K D O W N R U N N I N G B A C K

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