DaeSean Hamilton and Jason Cabinda were the recipients of Penn State football’s outstanding senior award at the team’s annual banquet on Sunday.
The honor goes to the Nittany Lion senior who made the greatest career contribution to Penn State football. Or, in this case, seniors.
And Cabinda certainly made more than his share, serving as co-captain and de facto No. 1 spokesman among his teammates, making 35 career starts and leading the team in tackles two of the past three seasons. His legacy at Linebacker U. is assured.
But perhaps more than anyone, as a fifth-year senior Hamilton has personified the resilience, growth and grit of Penn State football over the past half-decade.
“DaeSean,’ James Franklin said this season, ‘has had a great career, has been a great leader, a great teammate, and a great student.”
THE BEGINNINGS…
This was then:
When Hamilton arrived on campus in June 2013 after being recruited by Bill O’Brien, Penn State was in the midst of heavy NCAA sanctions, the Nittany Lions had won just nine of their previous 16 games and the raw freshman from Fredericksburg, Va., was a month away from surgery for a broken bone in his left wrist.
As it was, Hamilton sat out the 2013 season and went 13 months without even catching a football. His first semester of college ended with O’Brien’s departure and Penn State seeking to hire its fourth head coach in 27 months.
Meantime, attendance at Beaver Stadium had dipped to its lowest level since the stadium had expanded in 2001.
And Hamilton was left wondering if he would ever be fully healthy enough again to play football for Penn State.
…THE ROAD TO NOW
But, this is now, and this is Hamilton’s path here:
As a redshirt freshman in 2014 — Franklin’s first season at PSU— Hamilton led the team with 82 receptions, second all-time at Penn State. Then, his production dipped to 45 catches in 2015 and then to just 34 in 2016 — combined, less than his rookie record. Hamilton’s downward trajectory hit its low ebb at Heinz Field against Pitt in 2016, when he dropped a deep pass that might have given Penn State the win. As the same time, the Nittany Lions were on a tough string as well. Franklin was just 16-14 in his first 30 games as head coach.
But, Hamilton and the Nittany Lions have rebounded — and then soared — nicely. As Penn State last season rode a nine-game winning streak to the Rose Bowl, Hamilton caught a team-high eight passes for 118 yards in Penn State’s Big Ten championship game win over Wisconsin.
Then they dipped. Penn State blew a 14-point lead over the final eight minutes and change against USC in Pasadena to lose 52-49. And Hamilton, in his 40th game as a Nittany Lion, didn’t catch a single pass.
‘I played horrible last year. That’s really all it was,’ Hamilton said a few weeks ago. ‘I really didn’t have a good year; it was more like the past year-and-a-half, two years I don’t think I played that well. That’s what it came down to. (Over the summer), I was working out two or three times a day to get that monkey off my back.’
It’s no surprise, then, that on Sunday Hanilton also won the Iron Lion Award, given to the player who ‘demonstrates the cornerstone of the Penn State football strength and conditioning program: strength and consistency.’
A RENEWAL: THE PLAYER
That work paid off.
‘That dude,’ as quarterback Trace McSorley put in mid-season, ‘he’s put in so much work his whole career. He’s had his ups and downs, but he’s continued to step up.’
In 2017, Hamilton led all Nittany Lion wide receivers with 48 catches (tight end Mike Gesicki topped the team, with 51) and had a team-high 747 receiving yards. His seven TD receptions nearly matched the nine he had in his previous three seasons combined.
With just the Fiesta Bowl remaining, the fifth-year wide receiver and 2017 co-captain leaves as the Nittany Lions’ all-time leading receiver (209 receptions) and No. 3 in receiving yardage (2,732 yards, needing 40 more against Washington to pass Deon Butler for No. 2 all-time). He’s made a team-high 50 starts, and has caught a pass in 50 of the 52 games he played in.
A stellar student, Hamilton is on the cusp of earning his second degree from Penn State. He has been Academic All-Big three times and twice he’s been named selected as second-team All-Big Ten, as a redshirt freshman and again in 2017. That, in and of itself, explains the arc of his career.
‘It takes patience and not giving up on yourself, not giving up on what you’ve been doing all your career and all season,’ Hamilton said a few weeks ago. ‘The times do get tough, but you’ll be able to get through it as long as you’re patient and continue working through it. And good things will pay off.’
Not just for Hamilton, but for Franklin and Penn State as well.
A RENEWAL: THE PROGRAM
The Nittany Lions, who finished the 2017 regular season 10-2 and ranked No. 9 in the CFP final rankings, have won 19 of their last 22 games. They have done so in masterful fashion. In that stretch, they have won by an average of 28.4 points. And lost by just seven points. Total. In the polls, the Nittany Lions were ranked as high as No. 2 in the nation in October, their best spot in the national polls since 1999.
Hamilton & Co. arrived with faint hopes of a postseason appearance and will leave having played in back-to-back New Year’s Six bowl games — first, the Rose and now the Fiesta against Washington on Dec. 30 in Glendale, Ariz. Those bowls were preceded by an overtime victory in the Pinstripe Bowl in Yankee Stadium and an appearance in the TaxSlayer Bowl.
Over the past five seasons the Nittany Lions have gone 42-22 and have virtually owned their home turf. They have had consecutive 7-0 records in Beaver Stadium and own a 20-1 mark at home since 2015. In contrast, from Nov. 12, 2011 — when Penn State fell 17-14 to — through the end of the 2014 season, the Nittany Lions were 13-9 in Beaver Stadium.
Attendance has grown as well. Penn State averaged 106,707 per game in 2017, which is 10,120 more than the average of 96,587 per game in Hamilton’s first season in Happy Valley.
Penn State put on an exclamation point on the 2017 regular season with its 66-3 win at Maryland, the most points ever scored by a PSU team in a Big Ten game and the largest margin of victory in a Big Ten game in program history. The win gave the Nittany Lions their first back-to-back 10-win regular seasons since 2008-09. Before that, the last time the program had consecutive double-digit regular season records was in 1985-86 (11-0 and 11-0).
In 2017, Penn State’s offense and defense both ranked No. 7 nationally in scoring (scoring 41.6 points and yielding just 15.5) as the team ranked No. 4 in turnover margin (plus-14). Penn State’s roster is deep and its team balanced. Hamilton can remember when that was not the case in either case. Franklin can too.
“I think we’re trending in the right direction right now,” Franklin said after the Maryland game. “I’m very just pleased with the program overall and the progress that we’re making. … We still have a lot of work to do, but I’m happy with where we’re at.”
Since then, offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead has departed for Mississippi State, and he took running backs coach and special teams coordinator Charles Huff with him. Defensive coordinator Brent Pry’s name has surfaced in regards to the head coaching vacancy at Louisiana-Lafeyette.
In addition, in 2018 the Nittany Lions must replace seven starters on defense. And, assuming Saquon Barkley takes its talents to the NFL, Franklin must also replace 56% of the 2017 squad’s rushing yards, 64% of its receiving yards and 68% of its points.
To say nothing of finding the next DaeSean Hamilton.
