THE SKINNY

Height/Weight: 5-foot-11, 165 pounds
Hometown/High School: Fort Washington, MD (National Christian Academy)
Ranking: ★★★★ (0.9159 — No. 229 overall)
Notable Offers: Arkansas, Michigan, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Virginia Tech

HIGHLIGHTS

THE TALE

Penn State offered Joshuah Moten last January, and then proceeded to host the four-star Maryland prospect for visits in March, June, and then in September for the Whiteout game. Cornerbacks coach Terry Smith popped in at National Christian Academy earlier this January, and from there, the wheels started turning for Moten to make the call for the Nittany Lions.

OUTLOOK

If this offseason is any precursor to future offseasons, it’s going to be difficult to know what the depth chart will look like for Moten at cornerback. What we know for sure is that redshirt senior John Reid will be gone, while junior Tariq Castro-Fields very well could leave early for the NFL draft. If those two are the only departures, that would leave Penn State with five other cornerbacks: Donovan Johnson, DJ Brown, Trent Gordon, Keaton Ellis, and Marquis Wilson. Still way too early, but not the most daunting depth chart for Moten.

As for the rest of the 2020 class, I would expect big numbers everywhere, including at cornerback. As of this writing, Penn State has 21 commits in the 2019 class, but say it ends up taking 25 — that would mean Penn State is at 69 (nice) scholarship players for 2020, meaning it could fit 16 2020 prospects without any attrition. As we know, there will be attrition — prior to this offseason, 8-10 was about average — so a class of 25 would be an easy fit. With the transfer portal and there seemingly being more transfers because of it, you can safely say that 28 is the working number for the 2020 class.