Penn State defensive end Aaron Maybin brought the largest crowd to attend a college football game this season to its feet when he recorded his 10th sack of the year in a 46-17 win over Michigan this past Saturday.
But drawing cheers from a crowd of nearly 110,000 fans in upstate Pennsylvania, however, always was a goal for the former Mount Hebron star — just ask his high school football coach.
“He came in and wrote me a letter between his freshman and sophomore year,” then-Mount Hebron coach Larry Luthe said. “It said he wanted to play football at Penn State. A lot of people say it, but he took the time to put it in writing. It was his dream.”
Maybin, who received dozens of awards at Mount Hebron in Ellicott City, was offered full athletic scholarships from schools such as Virginia, Florida and Maryland. But in 2005 after attending Penn State’s upset Ohio State in State College, Pa., he held a press conference at school to announce he’d be a Nittany Lion.
“There’s so many things I love,” Maybin, a sophomore, said. “I fell in love with the school and just the program in general — the way the fans embrace us and are behind us no matter what, and the coaches are really behind us and support us 110 percent.”
The 6-foot-4, 236-pounder has had no trouble developing a fan club this season.
Maybin has shined for No. 3 Penn State (8-0) and earned numerous recognition from the Big Ten and other publications and being thrust into the starting lineup due to suspensions and dismissals along the defensive line. He ranks second in the nation with 10 sacks, trailing only TCU’s Jerry Hughes (11) and leads the country in tackles-for-loss with 14.5.
“I expect to do a lot of great things on the field and have worked very hard to get to the position I am in,” Maybin said. “But I have a long way to go before I feel like I have reached my potential.”
Maybin, who redshirted his freshman year in 2006, has a chance to receive even more national attention when the Nittany Lions visit No. 9 Ohio State (7-1) on Saturday night at 8 in front of a national television audience on ABC.
“I just wish I could put weight on him,” Penn State coach Joe Paterno said. “He doesn’t eat, but he’s doing very well. He’s so quick and he loves to play. You can see that.”
Michael Maybin, Aaron’s father and also a Penn State alumnus, said he is thrilled to see his son’s name on the stat sheet and on television, but is even prouder of the way he has matured in State College. Aaron’s mother, Connie, died due to birth complications with his sister when he was 6-years-old. Maybin used his experience to be supportive for roommate and linebacker Navorro Bowman, whose father died this year.
But Michael has noticed even more subtle changes in his son: from him slated to graduate in just three years in May with a degree in Communications to a new approach to being on time.
“We were down to see him at the Outback Bowl [in 2006] and hadn’t seen him in about a month and we were out to eat and he said he had to meet coach Paterno at 7:30 for a meeting,” Michael said. “He started getting ready to leave at 6, and I asked him what he was doing. He told me ‘Dad, for Coach Paterno, being a half-hour is early and being on time is late.”
Maybin doesn’t plan on changing his approach anytime soon.
“Until I reach my peak, I am not going to be satisfied,” he said. “As long as those flaws are there, I am going to continue to keep pushing and working every day I step on the field.”
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