Coach | 2022 ATH & Notre Dame Target Benji Gosnell "A Freak Athletically"

Saying Benjamin Gosnell‍ does it all for East Surry High School may be a bit of an overstatement…but just a bit.

“He’s played for us for two years and he’s played quarterback, tailback, split wide receiver, inline tight end, defensive end, inside linebacker, outside linebacker and defensive back,” East Surry head coach Trent Lowman says of the 2022 North Carolina athlete.

So, Gosnell has basically played everything except offensive. Lowman says, “And he could do that because of the aggressiveness he likes to play with. There’s not a skillset that he lacks.”

College scouts have taken notice and the 6-foot-4, 225-pounder has seen a surge in his recruitment, recently collecting scholarship offers from schools like Notre Dame, Georgia, Penn State, Virginia Tech and Nebraska among others.

“He’s got offers as an inside linebacker, as an outside linebacker/defensive end, as a tight end and as an H-back,” says Lowman. “It’s not like he’s just one thing and one thing and one thing only on the college level. He can play multiple spots.

“He’s real swift as a wide receiver. He has really good hands and understands route-running as a receiver, but he’s got a get-off and a motor like a top five defensive lineman and he’s got offers as both…He’s a bit of a freak athletically.”

Lowman says Gosnell is “a different kind of player.”

“He’s kind of a throwback player who has trained to be a really good football player and not focused on becoming a certain position,” says Lowman.

While that versatility has helped his team and helped Gosnell grow as a player, it also means his ceiling is probably higher than most.

“He might practice blocking as a tight end, running routes as a receiver for 15 minutes, let him practice running back for 10 and flip him over and do the same type of thing on defense,” says Lowman. “He never gets to train in-depth.

“When he gets to college and gets to practice at tight end or at linebacker for two hours every day and have meetings on it, he’s going to blow up and flourish.”

The night before the offer from Notre Dame came, Lowman and Gosnell actually had a discussion about the Irish.

“He actually mentioned how Notre Dame had the first tight end to go in the NFL Draft and that they were talking to him,” Lowman says.

Gosnell is also hearing from Ohio State.

“When the traditional powerhouses are involved, it kind of makes you take a step back and say, ‘This is real,’” Lowman says. “That’s not to downplay any of the local schools like NC State and Chapel Hill, but they are the local schools.

“They’re an hour and a half away and 30 minutes away, but now we’re nationwide with teams that are always in the hunt for national championships and everyone knows them, not just people in state. It’s been fun, but he’s still in awe and he’s still excited as we are.”

The next step for Gosnell will depend on when the dead period is lifted and prospects are able to visit college campuses again.

“One thing I do know with Benji is they’re going to be very thorough…They’re extremely loyal as a family, but they’re extremely independent and they look ahead to the future. They’re not very emotional in their decisions. They’re very logical, very rational. I could see him taking a lot of time and talking with his mom and dad and deciding which schools to visit, putting that plan in place and narrowing it down from there.

“It’ll be done right. It’ll be done thoroughly. We just hope things open back up so it can happen.”