Carson Hynes -- all 6-8, 305 pounds of him -- set to sign with Northern Iowa

Dec. 2—PLAINVIEW, Minn. — Wednesday will mark the fulfillment of a dream that started for Carson Hynes in seventh grade.

The 6-foot-8, 305-pound offensive tackle will sign the papers that will officially make him a college football player. This mountain of a man is pledging to Division I school University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls.

"It was in seventh grade when I truly knew I'd have the size to play in college," said Hynes, who was 6-feet and 200 pounds as a seventh-grader and accurately predicted to get a lot taller and bigger than that. "My parents knew I had the genetics to play in college. So I set my goal in seventh grade to do it."

Hynes verbally committed to Northern Iowa at the end of May.

"I'm very excited; I've been looking forward to it for a while, ever since I committed in May," Hynes said. "I picked Northern Iowa because they had a genuine belief in me."

A pair of knee surgeries for Hynes during his high school days scared a few teams off. North Dakota State, the University of North Dakota, South Dakota State and the University of South Dakota — all Division I schools — had also shown interest in Hynes, but had given him no formal offer before Hynes said yes to Northern Iowa.

And this went deeper than the Panthers just liking him as a football player.

"They valued me as a person," said Hynes, also an excellent student.

Hynes, who had knee surgeries as a sophomore and a junior, spent his final football season at P-E-M looking as good as new. Wearing double knee braces, as he will also do in college, Hynes kept his legs healthy the entire season.

That allowed him to show what he can do, which is a lot.

"Carson performed excellently," P-E-M coach Daren Wingert said. "Whoever he got his hands on, he dominated. That was as healthy as he'd been in a long time. When we could run behind him, good things happened."

Wingert is not at all surprised that Northern Iowa scooped him up.

"He's 6-8, 305, and he moves well," Wingert said. "Once his college coaches get their paws on him, he is going to be very good. You can't teach 6-8, 305."

You can't always teach attitude, either, which happens to be one more area where Hynes checks all the boxes.

"He is one of those guys that you wish you had 100 of him," Wingert said. "He's a good person, a good student, and a good teammate. And he does all the things you ask of him. He checks all the boxes. He's the kind of person that you want to coach."

And on the football field, he keeps improving. That's because he keeps working at it.

This past summer, that included strength, speed and agility drills. His diligence raised him to another level.

"I've definitely gotten a lot better with my movement," Hynes said. "I just made sure I'd recovered from my knee surgeries. And I really worked on my speed and lateral movement."

Hynes, also a basketball player, intends to continue working out until he's mandated to be on the Northern Iowa campus, which is in early July.

Whether that will be enough to get him on the field as a true freshman won't be determined until late August.

This likely won't be the last time the Hynes family goes through this recruiting and signing process. Carson, who is considered a dominant run blocker and also didn't allow a sack in his three years as a P-E-M starter, has a freshman brother, Caden Hynes, who's already being projected to play at the next level. Caden is 6-5, 250.

"He's getting there," Carson said.

* Hynes is one of two local players who will be signing during this first week of the signing period, Caledonia's Maddox Walk the other. The defensive lineman has agreed to go to Bemidji State.

* Triton star Pierce Petersohn, who recently flipped his commitment from Penn State to Virginia Tech, isn't expected to officially sign until February. Petersohn is a four-star recruit and considered one of the top four recruits in the state.