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P L A Y E R B I O S yards rushing on only 14 carries li=ed the Wolverines to a 17- 14 victory. The game brought an end to Smith's high school coaching career, as he moved on to coach at Temple the following year. But a=er one season in Philadelphia, he went to work for his college alma mater as a member of James Franklin's sta; and began developing a plan to recruit Sanders. The :rst part of that plan proved highly successful, as Sanders committed to Penn State in July 2014, only six months a=er Franklin and his sta; had arrived in University Park. But the second part? That was going to be challenging, because it meant fending o; just about every elite program in the country for 18 months while awaiting the day when Sanders could sign a letter of intent. If they were go- ing to succeed, the Nittany Lion sta; had to make sure that Sanders and his mother, Marlene, were prepared for what Smith called "the on- slaught." "At the time we of- fered Miles, he had only two or three o;ers," Smith said. "So we created a plan [to ensure that he understood] that the Al- abamas and Ohio States of the world were going to come lat- er. We were prepared for that, and we just held to that plan and we kept recruiting him." The plan proved invaluable, as interest in the 5-foot-11, 195-pound Sanders continued to skyrocket a=er he :nished his career at Woodland Hills with 4,573 rushing yards and 59 touchdowns. His rushing total was the :=h-highest in WPIAL Class AAAA history, and it could have been even higher if the Wolverines hadn't made a habit of bolting out to big leads. Said Novak, "All of his yards were with the game on the line. In a lot of games when we had teams beat early, he didn't carry the ball that much. One game in the playo;s this year, he carried the ball three times and had two touchdowns and 150 yards. Against some of the better teams, he would have 200 yards or so. But he rarely had more than 15 carries in a game." Sanders received 27 scholarship o;ers, including o;ers from three of the four teams that took part in this year's Col- lege Football Playo;. Their interest was entirely understand- able. As his high school coach noted, Sanders is a special tal- ent. "In my 29 years here, I think we've only had four fresh- men who've started for us," Novak said. "He's one of them." It appeared for a while as though Sanders was having sec- ond thoughts. He acknowledged via Twitter in January that "this recruiting process isn't easy. I'm just making sure I go to the school that's best for me." Novak said that when other WPIAL prospects began taking o

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