Thomas Holley wasn’t even playing organized football two years ago, when Jerry Sandusky put Penn State to shame and cast a giant shadow over one of the most storied programs in college football, as well as its legendary coach, Joe Paterno.
But soon, Holley could become one of the players who helps put Penn State back on the road to respectability. The Abraham Lincoln HS defensive end, who has just 21 organized football games under his belt, is about to make his college choice, and his list consists of just two schools: Penn State and Florida. The announcement could come as early as this week.
The buzz is that Holley will pick the Nittany Lions, partly because he wants to stay closer to home but also because he has a cousin who attends the school. Holley has also made it clear that he has nothing but respect for the program and its current coaching staff, including head coach Bill O’Brien and defensive line coach Larry Johnson.
If Holley does pick Penn State, he would be the first New York City football player to go there since the school was penalized following the Sandusky child molestation scandal, which broke in late 2011. When the school lost numerous scholarships and the ability to play in the postseason for four years, there were questions about whether the Nittany Lions would be able to recruit the best prep players in the country.
Now, they are on the verge of landing a player who has been ranked as the best in New York State by some recruiting services.
“He’s gone,” Holley said, referring to Sandusky without saying his name. “It was a sad situation, but the past is the past. Everybody there (now), it wasn’t their fault that it happened. So you have to look forward. It’s just a place where I’d have an opportunity to do big things. You have to look at the smaller things sometimes.”
Holley seems particularly enamored with Johnson’s track record of sending players to the NFL. His son is former Kansas City Chiefs star running back Larry Johnson.
“That’s where I wanna get (the NFL), and if he’s a person who can get me there and have me prepared better than another person, then why not?” Holley said.
Holley, who won’t turn 18 until May, was a basketball standout for most of his childhood, ranked higher than current Railsplitters hoops star Isaiah Whitehead, who will play at Seton Hall. He started his high school career at Christ the King, one of the best basketball schools in the country.
Holley played in eight football games for Lincoln last season and 13 this season, which ended on Tuesday with the Railsplitters winning the PSAL championship by beating Tottenville at Yankee Stadium. He finished the season with 74 tackles and 10 sacks.
Not too shabby for a kid who admitted to not knowing how to put shoulder pads on less than two years ago.
“He is a highly motivated kid who pays attention and I can see a tremendous improvement in him from when he first got on the field,” Lincoln football coach Shawn O’Connor said. “He’s highly motivated and he has tremendous physical ability.”
O’Connor has sent at least one other player to the University of Florida — receiver Nyan Boateng, who also played basketball and football at the Coney Island high school before briefly attending Giants training camp in 2010. O’Connor said Florida is one of the first schools to have offered Holley a scholarship, and while he said Holley is loyal to the Gators because of that, he does not know where Holley will end up.
O’Connor knows Holley was less concerned with the Nittany Lions being unable to play in bowl games than he was with the loss of scholarships, which greatly affects a program’s ability to field a competitive team. But in September, the NCAA announced that it will ease the scholarship penalties against the school, allowing Penn State an additional five scholarships beginning in 2014. By 2016, when Holley would be a junior, the Nittany Lions will have their full allotment of 85 scholarships back.
“I know when those sanctions were reduced, that put (Penn State) back in the forefront with Thomas,” O’Connor said.
Holley will sit down this week to discuss his choices with his mother, Candice Benjamin, and his uncle, Scott Benjamin, who was Holley’s AAU basketball coach and took him on numerous unofficial visits last summer.
He’s interested in majoring in business and wants to pick a school that will offer him the best overall experience. If weather is a factor as well, then all he had to do was step outside on Saturday to get a feel for what winters will be like in State College, Pa.
“For me, I like a school to have the total package,” Holley said. “Do they have what I want to major in — for me that’s business — how is the environment, because it’s a place I’ll have to live the next three or four years, and then the football program . . .does it have what I need to be successful?”
Holley has yet to play for the Railsplitters defending city champion basketball team this season because the PSAL requires eight practices before a player can take the floor. He also has one high school football game left, The Under Armour All-American game in St. Petersburg, Fla., on Jan. 2.
By then, everyone should know where he’ll be playing college football next season.
“I have an idea but I’m not 100%,” Holley said. “So I want to make sure I sit down with my uncle and the rest of my family and just collaborate.”
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