There are just a dozen players remaining from the Class of 2014, only seven of them who originally joined the Penn State football team as scholarship players the summer that James Franklin took over the team.
Mark Allen is one of them, the first player in that class to commit to Penn State, pledging to former head coach Bill O'Brien and his staff back in October 2012. The Nittany Lions' fifth-year senior running back doesn't know where the time went.
"It's crazy to think that I'm that old," he said, laughing.
Allen has watched Penn State go from 7-6 seasons during the sanction years to a contender on the national stage. He has seen teammates in his class, and a few who came after him, go on to star in college and sign NFL contracts. His own role on the team has been modest on autumn Saturdays — he entered the season with 65 career carries — but his infectious personality and fierce work ethic have earned him the admiration and respect of teammates and coaches.
At 5-foot-6, he is an underdog from an underdog class; that 2014 group was ranked 24th in the nation according to the 247Sports Composite recruiting team rankings. But that scrappy class has seen 40 wins and counting, and Allen attributes that to the bonds he has seen form among his teammates as much as their talent.
"That 2014 class was a very close group," Allen said. "We developed strong relationships throughout the entire class. You can see it's passed down to the other classes.
"If that can keep going through each group, it'll make the team better as a whole."
The oldest of Clarence and Shanita Allen's four children, Mark Allen grew up in Hyattsville, Maryland playing sports but not watching them on television. He began to realize he had a serious future in football during his 10th grade year, when he made the varsity squad at perennial Maryland high school power DeMatha Catholic.
"Usually, that doesn't happen," he said.
Despite his speed (4.4 in the 40-yard dash), Allen wasn't a top prospect, but the summer before his junior year, Allen went to a camp at Penn State, and performed well enough that O'Brien met with him and told him that if he was able to replicate that performance through the first few games of the season, there would be a scholarship offer for him. Allen ran for nearly 700 yards through the first seven games before his promising season came to an abrupt end when he tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee on Oct. 13.
O'Brien kept his word, though, and a Penn State offer came two days after that. Allen committed to the Nittany Lions the following day, on Oct. 16.
His football future was secure, but the present proved to be one of the most challenging periods Allen had faced in his young life. He admits to being so despondent during the first few months after the injury that he would leave school early, but he kept his grades together and did his best to support his teammates. Later, when he watched teammates have to overcome injuries, he became grateful that he endured his trial at an early age.
"I had my reality check earlier than other guys," he said, "which molded me into a better person."
Allen wore a knee brace during his first summer and fall at Penn State but finally began to feel more like his old self during the following spring. He also had to contend with a crowded depth chart at running back, where the bulk of reps and touches during the 2015-17 seasons went to Saquon Barkley.
Allen worked hard in practice and tried to take advantage of the limited game action he saw, scoring his first career touchdown on a 13-yard reception in the 2015 game against San Diego State, then making his first career start a week later against Army ("I didn't even think I was playing that day. My helmet was all strapped up weird," he recalled).
Taking a cue from then-running backs coach Charles Huff, Allen tried to prepare for every game as though he were a starter.
"If you don't have that preparation, when you get into the game, you aren't going to be able to perform at the level of the starting running back," he said.
As he moved from underclassman to upperclassman, Allen improved his pass-receiving skills and, more importantly, his knowledge of the offense and how opposing defenses would try to attack it.
"If you understand the game more, it makes you play the game faster," he said. "I feel like I know the system extremely well, so I can be a source for anybody. I know some of the quarterback stuff, to be honest."
With Barkley now in the NFL, Allen is competing with junior Miles Sanders and true freshman Ricky Slade for snaps. He knows he's still an underdog, all these years later, and understands why. He's watched other pint-sized players, including Darren Sproles of the Philadelphia Eagles and Tarik Cohen of the Chicago Bears, and seen a chip on their shoulders that he recognizes.
"I'm a firm believer that God made us short but gave us all the biggest hearts," he said. "You need to have heart to play this game, and I'm not scared to match up against anybody. I feel like my heart's the size of the world, to be honest."
Allen picked up his degree in criminology last August and is working on a master's in management and organizational leadership. Those skills should serve him well in his next planned venture — college football coaching. He credits his high school coaches and Huff, now with Mississippi State, with being models for him not only at shaping players' skill sets but shaping young men.
"If I can implement how they changed my life, hopefully I can carry it on to change others," he said. "I want to make it to the top. Everyone aspires to be a head coach, but you've got to take baby steps first."
For now, Allen is looking to savor his final year at Penn State, including the rap battles with his teammates during Friday nights in hotels on the road, then being able to "hit the switch" and lock in on Saturdays. He and classmates Troy Apke, Koa Farmer, Billy Fessler, Trace McSorley, Amani Oruwariye, Tom Pancoast and Nick Scott were close from the beginning, dubbing themselves "The Elite Eight."
Apke, Fessler and Pancoast have moved on. The other five, and the rest of Penn State's fifth-year crew, want to win a few more games, and continue building the foundation that has helped the Nittany Lions develop into a deep, talented, and above all, resilient program.
"If we know what we're capable of, we can influence the young guys, and try our best to get the young guys on the same board and we can take off from there," Allen said. "If you have a together team, I feel those are the most dangerous teams."
