Brendan Hall doesn’t know exactly how Penn State discovered him.
He had never visited the campus and hadn’t developed a relationship with the coaching staff.
But when Director of Scouting Xavier Quigley called him to tell him he had been offered, Hall was thrilled.
“I was like, oh my god,” Hall told Nittany Sports Now. “I was ecstatic. I mean, knowing Penn State and their kind of, you know, their last few years or like ten years, just they’re known for being such a dominant team, and that reputation they have has like made me really excited and honored to get an offer to play there.”
Hall, a three-star prospect from South Mecklenburg High School in Charlotte, North Carolina, is 6-foot-7, 310 pounds and also has offers from Clemson, Maryland, Kentucky, NC State and South Carolina.
He has fall visits planned for Clemson and South Carolina, and is also looking to go to Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Tennessee and James Franklin’s Virginia Tech.
Hall isn’t sure if he can work out a visit to Penn State with his offer coming weeks before the start of the season, but he’s hoping to get to Beaver Stadium for a recruiting visit.
“I love how rowdy it gets,” he said, “and you know, Penn State’s like kind of the pinnacle of a rowdy stadium, which I absolutely love.”
So what does the Carolina kid know about Pennsylvania?
“I definitely know it’s cold up there,” he said. “Luckily for me, I love the cold. I love that kind of stuff.”
Hard to argue with that.
Hall said Penn State is impressed with his size, and that’s a big reason they’re recruiting him.
“Coach Quigley said two of the NFL linemen they have were smaller than me,” Hall said. “He said he liked my frame and athletic ability.”
One thing that’s worth noting is that Hall’s father, Les, played at Clemson from 1988-1992, and Hall didn’t deny that this gives Dabo Swinney’s program an advantage.
“I definitely would say so,” he said. “I mean, definitely my history from going there. I’ve been going there ever since I was a little boy, going to games and all that kind of stuff.
But Les Hall made it clear to his son that he didn’t want family history to be the sole factor in his decision.
“Don’t be biased at all because you know, don’t go somewhere, cause I went there,’” Brendan Hall said. “Go somewhere cause you love it. So, I am never gonna go anywhere being biased; always gonna go open-minded, always gonna see what they have to offer.
