‘We Ain’t Proved Nothing Yet’: Penn State OL Didn’t Listen to Criticism, Won’t Get Distracted by Hype

UNIVERSITY PARK– Penn State wasn’t very good when Nick Dawkins started his college football career, and neither was its offensive line.

Dawkins, who, like most underclassmen, cut his teeth on the scout team for his first two seasons, remembers the o-line and its young coach, Phil Trautwein, were under plenty of scrutiny.

“I remember people gunning for coach’s job,” Dawkins said at Penn State’s Local Media Day last Saturday, “speaking very ill on the offensive line play. It is what it is. I get it.”

Fast forward four years, and things are a lot different, both for Penn State’s program in general and for the offensive line.

The team went from mediocre (11-11 between 2020 and 21) to elite (A College Football Playoff Semifinal berth in 2024), and this year has the potential to be the best one yet.

The line has gone from the butt of many jokes to arguably America’s best, and this season could be the best of all.

For Dawkins, a key to keeping this success is not listening to what people from the outside are saying.

Just as they didn’t listen to the criticism four years ago.

“We didn’t listen to it then,” he said, “we’re not going to listen to praise now because it’s all about our process and how we operate and attack. If we listen to other people all the time, then we probably wouldn’t be where we’re at. It’s just a lot of hard work. We’re doing the same process, the same work as before. It just took a little bit to develop, and we have the right guys in here doing the right things.”

Dawkins is at the center– literally– of it all.

In this era of college football— NIL, the transfer portal, etc.– Dawkins is a rare breed.

Not a lot of people could have stayed for four years without starting, but Dawkins did it, knowing his time would come.

His time finally came last season, and he took advantage of the opportunity.

Now, he leads a unit that has a lot to offer, both in talent and depth.

BIG VEGA

Penn State’s win over UCLA last season was, for the most part, boring.

PSU was supposed to win by a lot (28.5) and ended up winning by slightly less (16).

Although the game happened just 10 months ago, there’s a good chance most PSU fans have forgotten all about it.

Except for one play.

Guys who weigh 330 pounds aren’t supposed to move like Vega Ioane can.

Guys who play left guard aren’t supposed to line up at wide receiver.

But Ioane has the talent to move at a rapid speed for his build, and offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki has the vision to occasionally line him up wide.

That led to one of the most impressive plays of Penn State’s season, unfortunately for UCLA’s Luke Schuerman.

For those who haven’t seen it yet, here you go.

The block led to Ioane getting an NIL deal, and one could argue that it put him on the map nationally.

Penn State OL Gets NIL Deal After Viral Play

Now, Ioane is thought by many to be a first-round pick in next year’s Draft, and per Dawkins, he has the least amount of body fat on the offensive line.

“Look at him,” Dawkins said. “He looks good. I mean, look at him.”

“I think anything you can cut down and be more agile, and it’s not like he’s 250 pounds. He’s still very dense, a heavy offensive lineman, but very lean and very agile. It’s only going to improve his game because he’s strong enough that his force and his punch and just how sturdy he is, he’s going to make up for any lost weight. Obviously, if you’re losing that weight and losing body fat, it means you’re losing fat and not muscle.”

Ioane is an unconventional offensive lineman, and his path to Penn State was unconventional, too.

Penn State doesn’t often get players from the state of Washington.

That’s obviously because Washington is pretty darn far from Happy Valley.

Initially, the play was for Ioane to stay close to home.

He committed to the University of Washington in June 2021 and stayed committed until literally the last minute, flipping to PSU on late signing day 2022.

Penn State fans don’t generally think of Washington firing coach Jimmy Lake as a positive moment in PSU football history.

But it kinda was.

“I took a chance on myself,” Ioane said at media days, “and told myself I needed to grow up a little and get away from home. It’s a really good thing I did. So, I’m proud of myself for that.”

THE RISING STAR

Because Penn State’s offensive line is eight, nine, maybe even 10 deep, some good football players are going to be left out.

There might be no better example of this than Cooper Cousins.

Cousins was a five-star, in-state product from McDowell High School.

He’s capable of playing right guard, and right guard is the only vacancy Penn State needs to fill on the line due to Sal Wormley (eligibility) being the only regular starter from last season not returning.

So that should create an opportunity, right?

Well, maybe not.

The thing is, Penn State has two players— Anthony Donkoh and Nolan Rucci— who stood out at right tackle last season.

Nothing is set in stone yet, but it’s hard to imagine either Donkoh or Rucci being left out of the starting lineup, and since Donkoh started his career at guard, it seems to be a good bet that’s where he’ll be to start the year.

There’s nothing much Cousins can do about that.

Except for work, and fortunately for Cousins, he does that quite well.

To the point where Trautwein ocassionally has to rein him in.

“I just kind of tell him how to work, because sometimes he works… I don’t want to say too hard, but he just has to be smart, too, and kind of put in different ways,” Trautwein said last Saturday. “Recovery. But he’s just an all-ball guy. He just loves ball and wants to be great, and he’s going to do everything he can to do that.”

Last season, Trautwein compared Cousins to two of his most prominent teammates at the University of Florida.

“He moves well, he’s a mauler, and whenever I kind of look at him sometimes, I think about the Pounceys,” he said last fall. “And they were great teammates and great guys. So being able to have two guys that I played with, went first round and played a long time in the NFL, and comparing him to them, that’s what kind of player I think Coop is.”

Penn State OL Coach Gives Cooper Cousins NFL Comp

“It’s incredible to be compared to players like them,” Cousins responded last Saturday.

THE MAYOR

Last season, Franklin called Dawkins “The Mayor of State College.”

It’s easy to see why.

Not only has Dawkins been at Penn State for a while— he’s entering his sixth season— his vibrant personality and work off the field have made him a fan favorite.

Dawkins’ off-the-field work has even gotten him national recognition. He was last year’s Wuerffel Trophy recipient, an award presented annually to the  “FBS player who best combines exemplary community service with leadership achievement on and off the field,” per its website.

It took a while for Dawkins to get here.

For four years, he was behind on the depth chart to players such as future draft picks Juice Scruggs and Hunter Nourzad.

Last year, he got his shot, and although he’s more experienced in the starting center role, he doesn’t feel things are getting any easier.

“I wouldn’t say I’m comfortable in this role at all,” Dawkins said. “I would say that I’m chasing greatness. I’m chasing the guys that were before me, I’m fighting, obviously, in a position battle at center, always because of the competition. I want to be the best center in the country, and you cannot be comfortable and be the best center in the country. That’s what I’m chasing. So I’m not chasing just getting my job done or trying to be a good football player here. I’m trying to be the best, and I’m not comfortable right now at all.”

For Cousins, it’s not difficult to see why Dawkins has become such a popular player.

“I mean, just sit down and listen to him talk,” he said.

“Why wouldn’t you wanna gravitate towards him? He’s the feel-good guy, and he’s the hardest worker on the team. I can ask him anything, film, technique, I can sit there and talk with him for an hour about football, and he reciprocates stuff back that I need to know and just need to hear. So I would just say the advice that he can give, too. You see what he does on the football field, but outside of the football field as well, it’s huge. Just looking at what he does for his foundation, and then just his community back in Allentown, is huge as well. So I think that’s why people look up to Dawk a lot. Not only the football player he is, but the human being that he is as well.”

THE UNSUNG HERO

Are enough people talking about Drew Shelton?

He isn’t as much of a specimen as Ioane.

He isn’t a rising star the way Cousins is.

He doesn’t run State College the way Dawkins does.

But when Dawkins talked about his teammates, he mentioned Shelton right there with Ioane as somebody who could go in the first round of next year’s Draft.

This echoes an eye-opening statement one of Shelton’s former teammates made.

“If everything goes right,” future first-round pick Olu Fashanu said at the 2024 NFL Combine in March, “he should be a lot better than I ever was at Penn State.”

‘He Should be a lot Better Than I Ever Was’: Penn State OT Olu Fashanu Hypes up Former Teammate

Months later, at a media availability before the Fiesta Bowl, Trautwein said Shelton is the player who reminds him the most of himself at Florida.

Since Trautwein’s been a college offensive line coach— starting at Boston College in 2018— only two of his linemen have burned their freshman redshirt.

The first was Chris Lindstrom, who went on to be a first-round pick and a three-time (as of now) all-Pro for the Atlanta Falcons.

Shelton was the second.

This summer, Shelton is playing everywhere, although he will almost certainly retain his role at left tackle.

There’s also something else.

“I‘ve gotten stronger,” he said. “A lot stronger, full summer and everything like that. Just continuing that kind of development to help me play with a little more power behind me.”

AIN’T SEEN NOTHING YET

Penn State has all the hype in the world coming into this season, and the offensive line is no exception.

The line has proven itself to be good, if not great.

But none of that matters.

“We ain’t proved nothing yet,” Ioane said. “Last year is over with. We did some good things, but that was last year, and we have a lot to prove this year.