Lions land North Penn
line recruit

By JOHN GIBLIN
Collegian Staff Writer

The Penn State football team has received another verbal commitment for the recruiting class of 2000 — this time from an offensive lineman.

Chris McKelvy, an offensive tackle from North Penn High School in Lansdale, pledged to play his collegiate football in Happy Valley yesterday during a noon press conference at North Penn High School. The 6-foot-4, 305-pound offensive lineman intended to make his announcement on July 7, his birthday, but North Penn football coach Mike Pettine, Jr. and Athletic Director Donald Ryan had to go out of town, so the announcement was postponed.

"McKelvy might be the best prospect in Pennsylvania this season," said Mike Bakas of the Eastern Football Journal. "It's hard not to love McKelvy's style of play. Once he locks on to his opponent, it's over.

"He plays with tremendous feet quickness for a player who is around 300 pounds," Bakas added. "Chris has all the tools to someday be playing (in the NFL) on Sundays."

McKelvy suffered two injuries last season, but was still named all-league and honorable mention all-state. During the third game of the season, when a lineman fell on the back of his leg, McKelvy tore his medial collateral ligament but continued to play the rest of the game.

After returning to the field four games later, the offensive lineman again fell victim to injury. Against Neshaminy, yet another lineman fell onto McKelvy, this time breaking his hand. But he was back in his starting position one game later.

Despite starting at tackle as a sophomore and junior, McKelvy will move to guard for the Knights this season, filling in for departed lineman Dave Costlow. Costlow, McKelvy's former weightlifting partner and teammate on the football and track and field teams, is a current member of the Nittany Lions football team.

"I'm good friends with Dave, but he didn't tell me much about Penn State," McKelvy said. "He wanted me to do it on my own, get my own impression."

McKelvy narrowed his choice of schools to Penn State and Nebraska from a field that included Big Ten rivals Michigan and Ohio State, as well as traditional-national-power Florida State. The senior received scholarship offers from more than 30 schools, including his top five choices, by early May.

During the last week of June, McKelvy took a tour of Midwest schools, including Iowa, Michigan, Nebraska, and Ohio State. It was this trip, McKelvy said, that helped him narrow his choices down to Penn State and Nebraska. He had visited both Penn State and Florida State earlier in the year.

"It was nice at Michigan — it was great. The town was nice and I liked the campus," McKelvy said. "But I wasn't really very impressed with the facilities. At Ohio State the facilities were excellent and the campus was nice. But the town part of it — it's more like a huge city, which I didn't like that much."

McKelvy has the same work ethic in the weightroom as on the football field — the senior lineman bench presses 385 pounds and squats 590 pounds. McKelvy's prowess on the field has carried into the classroom, where he boasts a 3.4 grade point average and a 1060 SAT score. He plans to major in health policy administration at Penn State.

"I was involved as little as possible after I talked to his parents," Pettine said. "I wanted him to go to a solid school, but I wanted him to decide. Selecting a college is a 40-year decision, not a four-year one. Chris might not play a down at Penn State."

Unlike most of Penn State's verbal commitments thus far, McKelvy did not participate in any summer football camps. He had attended the Penn State Nike training camps during the summer prior to his sophomore and junior seasons, but after a teammate and starter for the Knights injured himself at a camp, McKelvy spent the summer visiting numerous schools.