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Pitt Football Recruiting: 2014 recruit Patrick Amara talks ... Penn State

Jeff Hanisch-USA TODAY Sports

The Post-Gazette had a nice feature on 2014 Pitt recruit, Patrick Amara last week. The focus was on his relationship with former Panther running back and NFL star, Lesean McCoy, but there was some interesting stuff buried a bit at the bottom about Penn State.

Amara was apparently hoping to get an offer from the Nittany Lions, but one never came. Seems like he's got a bit of a chip on his shoulder about it:

Amara heard new Penn State coach James Franklin Saturday when Franklin said he plans to “dominate” recruiting in Pennsylvania in his tenure with the Nittany Lions.

Amara admitted that’s what he would expect Franklin to say, but he also remembers his own recruitment, when Penn State stopped recruiting him because of its limited scholarships.

“They were basically saying I wasn’t good enough to play there,” he said.

So even though it’s more than two years away, there’s already one date circled on Amara’s calendar: Sept. 10, 2016, when Pitt and Penn State will meet at Heinz Field for the first time since 2000.

And the never-shy Amara had a message for Pitt’s former and future in-state rivals: “2016, let’s just say it won’t be pretty for Penn State.”

In the grand scheme of things, that probably doesn't mean a whole lot. Still, it's interesting in that Amara has been one of Pitt's more vocal commits. If you're on Twitter, you've likely seen him reach out to anybody and everybody to come to the Panthers (you can follow him here, by the way, if you're so inclined).

No school can take every kid, obviously, and Pitt even found themselves on the other side of the argument before the bowl game against Bowling Green when it came to their quarterback, Matt Johnson. But hey, if Amara wants to take it personally against Penn State and use that to play with a fire under his butt, I'm all for it.

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