Wichita’s Breece Hall set to face K-State for the first time since choosing Cyclones
Breece Hall rushed for 4,209 yards in his final 25 games at one of the best high school football programs in Kansas.
He returns to his home state for the first time as a college player Saturday when Kansas State welcomes Iowa State at 6 p.m.
Hall became a high school All-American while at Wichita Northwest. He was selected to The Wichita Eagle’s Top 11 team and was arguably the state’s most dominant player after running for 2,127 in 13 games as a senior.
Hall picked up his first Division I offer on Nov. 21, 2017 from Iowa State. Less than two weeks later, K-State handed him his second. The offers started flooding in after that. Kansas was Hall’s seventh offer. Nebraska was his fifth.
By signing day, he held offers from traditional powers like Michigan and Tennessee, but he rolled with the program that believed in him first. Now he looks to burn one of the teams that couldn’t earn his commitment.
K-State coach Chris Klieman was hired about a month after Hall’s signing with the Cyclones. He never got a chance to recruit him, but Klieman said he knows how dangerous Hall can be.
“Great balance, tremendous physical toughness, running through arm tackles,” Klieman said. “The more reps he’s gotten, the better he has become. Really talented player, and we’ll have our hands full trying to corral him, especially because of all the weapons they have throwing the football; he’s been a big benefit to that, and he’s made the most of it.”
Hall enters Saturday’s regular-season finale with 806 rushing yards on 151 carries with nine total touchdowns. He is No. 2 in the country among true freshman running backs in rushing yards behind Boise State’s George Holani. He is No. 1 among Power 5 schools.
Seven players on the K-State roster played against Hall in high school. Many did not and have received their first taste in film study this week.
“He’s going to be one of the better backs we’ve faced this season, I think,” senior defensive tackle Trey Dishon said. “He’s a spinner. He loves to spin out of tackles. He’s going to be a force to stop.”
Dishon and Wyatt Hubert, a redshirt sophomore defensive end, are from Kansas and started as freshmen at K-State. Hubert said it’s impressive how quickly Hall climbed up the depth chart over guys who have been in the program for multiple years.
“Definitely wish he was here, but it’s going to be a touch challenge with him back there,” Hubert said. “He’s just a freshman, but he has a lot of ability to hurt us.”
Coming out of Northwest, Hall started receiving praise as perhaps the best running back in the history of the Wichita City League, a conference that has produced NFL players like Southeast’s Joseph Randle, East’s Bryce Brown and North’s Barry Sanders.
Northwest coach Steve Martin said Hall has found his footing at Iowa State.
Hall had 84 yards in his first four games at Iowa State, including zero yards on one attempt vs. Iowa. In Week 5, the Cyclones played West Virginia. Hall got 26 carries, 132 yards and three touchdowns. A week later against Texas Tech, he had 258 scrimmage yards on fewer touches.
“What coach (Matt) Campbell and those guys are doing up there is right up his alley,” Martin said. “He’s playing in the same system at Iowa State that he did at Northwest. That’s the reason he’s having so much success. The learning curve for him was going to be there in terms of the speed of the game and the terminology but not the style.”
Martin said he knows a lot of Hall’s family and friends will be at Bill Snyder Family Stadium to see Saturday’s game. Martin will not. He will be in Pittsburg, coaching in his second straight Kansas Class 5A state championship game as Northwest faces Mill Valley.
“I don’t think Breece took anything personally in recruiting,” Martin said. “I think he just went to the school that was right for him. I think he’s going to be excited.”