Penn State football redshirt report: Who redshirted during the 2021 season?
Twenty-two scholarship players took redshirts for Penn State Nittany Lions football in 2022.
Twelve of them were true freshmen, with Jaylen Reed and Kalen King being the only two first-year players who lost their redshirts by appearing in more than four games.
While that may seem like a smaller total than in seasons past, James Franklin pointed toward his team’s schedule as a reason for that. The Nittany Lions opened their season at Wisconsin, then took on Auburn in Week Three.
“We’ve got one of the most challenging schedules in college football, so that may factor into it,” Franklin said in October. “I wouldn’t necessarily say that this freshman class feels different than others, I think a lot of it is the schedule.”
Penn State’s non-freshman redshirts
*Scholarship players only
Pinegar played a significant role for the Nittany Lions in his first three seasons on campus, but appeared in only two games for Penn State in 2021.
Jordan Stout handled the lion’s share of Penn State’s field-goal attempts last season — a role he and Pinegar previously split.
Pinegar suffered an injury in camp before the season, but former Penn State special teams coordinator Joe Lorig clarified that Pinegar had been available for the Nittany Lions.
“I have total confidence in Jake,” Lorig said before the Outback Bowl. “I’m not just saying that, I really do. We just chart it every week. It’s literally just a chart, and whatever it tells us.
“You always have to remember that the most popular guys on the team are the backup quarterback and the backup kicker, because it’s easy to say, ‘Well, what would that guy have done?’”
Isaac contributed during his first two seasons in State College, but suffered an undisclosed injury before the season and did not play. James Franklin said his radio show that PSU is “excited” about getting him back out there for spring ball.
After appearing in eight games to help an injury-ravaged Penn State running back room as a true freshman, Holmes played three times in 2021, falling short of the redshirt threshold.
A junior college transfer, van den Berg played in Penn State’s Outback Bowl loss to Arkansas, registering five total tackles and a TFL.
Christ, Dottin, Mostella, Traore, Brevard and Israel-Achumba are all members of the Class of 2020 who did not meet the four-game threshold in 2020 or 2021. Administratively, Penn State is treating last season as their redshirt year, rather than 2020.
