Northwest Whitfield’s Synjen Herren committed to play football for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga on Monday, becoming the fourth member of the Times Free Press’s Dynamite Dozen to do so.
The 6-foot-3, 300-pound offensive lineman took his official visit to UTC last weekend. He said he also had an offer from Western Carolina, but the Mocs were the front-runners all along.
“I was pretty close to committing [before visiting], and just coming up there sealed it all,” said Herren, who met with Mocs recruiting coordinator Geep Wade on Monday night. “Chattanooga just stuck out to me.”
Herren didn’t begin playing organized football until the eighth grade. He’s come a long way since then but said there “will always be a lot of room for improvement.”
He will be the third Northwest Whitfield offensive lineman on the Mocs’ roster, joining redshirt sophomores Adam Miller and Dustin Tate.
“I know Adam pretty good, and the whole time I was up there I talked with him about everything,” Herren said. “He helped me out a lot.”
Bruins coach Mike Falleur said Herren is a bit bigger than either Tate or Miller was when they graduated. Herren also has more of a mean streak to him on the field, he said.
“He has a pretty nasty attitude in the way he plays,” he said, meaning it as a compliment. “He’s a tough-nosed, get-after-it type football player.”
Of the eight players the Mocs brought in last weekend, six have committed, counting Baylor’s Jacob Huesman and McCallie’s Jarrod Coleman who had previously picked UTC.
Huesman, Herren, Coleman and Calhoun’s Dustin Christian were members of the preseason Dynamite Dozen.