8/8/2019 football Edit

Holt is a 5-11, 225-pound package of want-to and production ready to impact

Tom Dienhart • BoilerUpload

GoldandBlack.com, Associate Editor

Nick Holt VI chuckles when asked what it was like to be Ben Holt’s older brother.

“He always wanted to play with me and my friends even though I was four-and-half years older,” said Nick Holt VI—known as "Nick Six" by his family. “He was always bigger. And he was tough.”

How tough?

“When I was in seventh grade and Ben was in third, we had a boxing tournament in our parent’s basement,” said Nick Six, who was a star linebacker at Western Kentucky. “It was all my friends and Ben. We had a bracket set up. We had one pair of boxing gloves, so each guy got one glove. And Ben beat the tar out of my friends and made some of them cry. He got to the final round, and it was me vs. Ben.”

You know how this story ends.

“He said he was gonna knock my head off and comes charging at me, and I just dropped him,” said Nick Six. “He started crying to mom. That was a common occurrence in our house.”

And that, Purdue fans, is the fire your new middle linebacker was forged in. If your last name is Holt, you better be tough.

“He didn’t get any sympathy from our mom,” said Nick Six. “She said, ‘What do you think will happen if you box older kids?’ “

Ben Holt is still trying to prove himself as a graduate transfer linebacker from Western Kentucky who just happens to be the son of ultra-intense defensive coordinator Nick Holt.

“It’s good have him,” said Nick Holt. “He brings energy and he knows our system. Gotta get him back full speed. He is a little banged up right now, but he is coming back fine. Obviously, he will help us out and we are gonna need him.”

Holt is part of a linebacking unit that has something to prove this fall. Fifth-year senior Markus Bailey is a captain and bellwether. Junior Cornel Jones, redshirt freshman Elijah Ball and sophomore Jaylan Alexander also will play key roles. And then there is Holt, No. 44.

"Everything is going good,” said Holt. “We have some great linebackers from Markus Bailey to Cornel, Jaylan, Elijah, all of those guys. They are great players and I am lucky to be in the room with them.”

What role will Holt play this fall in his one and only season at Purdue? In practices, he has typically lined up with the No. 1 group between Bailey and Alexander.

“I don’t know,” said Holt, who played at Bowling Green High for the father of Purdue tight end coach Ryan Wallace. “I will have to tell you after camp, maybe in Reno (where Purdue opens the season vs. Nevada on August 30).

While running sideline-to-sideline, it’s impossible not to catch a glimpse of a tattoo that covers Holt’s abdomen.

“It’s St. Michael, an old wise man and two family crests,” said Holt, lifting his jersey to show off the ink work. “I still have work to do but need more money.”

Mom and Dad aren’t fans of the artwork. But at this point, blood is thicker than ink, and Julie Holt is happy to have her son in town. In fact, she has both sons in town. Nick Six works for Kirby Risk while his fiancé works on her Ph.D. in biomedical engineering at Purdue.

“It’s a miracle, is what it is,” said Julie Holt, Ben’s mom. “It is unbelievable. We haven’t all been together in like four years. To have Nick Six be able to watch Ben and his dad is great. Ben is excited about being here. He wants the competition. He is excited about that."

Holt was a highly productive linebacker in his three season at Western Kentucky, which plays in Conference-USA. The 5-10, 220-pound Holt paced the Hilltoppers in stops in 2018 with 116 and in tackles for loss with 11.5. Holt also found time to break up five passes and tally 2.5 sacks. He finished as the No. 4 tackler in C-USA last season, when he also was a captain for WKU.

“I wasn’t thinking about (transferring) during the season,” said Holt. “I love my teammates. Still do. I wanted to stay down there. I made a decision to come up here and I love it and I don’t look back.”

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Ben Holt played for his dad in 2015 and 2016 after coming to WKU as a walk-on fullback when Nick Holt was the defensive coordinator for the Hilltoppers under Jeff Brohm. When Brohm got the Purdue job after the 2016 season, Nick Holt came along and Ben remained with Western Kentucky. Now, they are together again as Ben adjusts to going from Group of 5 to Power 5 football.

“You experience it in practice,” said Holt. “But when you have been playing football since third grade, football doesn’t change. It’s not like a whole new sport. The competition is better, bigger guys, better teams, well-coached, all those things.”

And now, he’ll get to play football again for his father … one last time.

“It is normal for me,” said Holt. “He is just ‘Coach.’ He gets on my butt and tells me what I have to do and taps me on the butt when I do a good job. He is just another coach.”

Does Ben get yelled at as much as the other players?

“Oh, of course,” he said. “He yells at me in practice, meetings and on the way home. He wants to make sure I am ready. It’s a big jump (in competition). The guys out here are a little bit taller and a little bigger. It’s still football. At the end of the day, you have to love it.”

Best of all for Ben Holt: He is able to play with his family watching. How often will he come home for some of Mom’s cooking? Every Sunday?

“He will call and say, ‘What are you having for dinner?’ I will say: ‘You are too late or we already have eaten. Or come over, we have plenty.'

“Ben is a real clean eater. A health guy. He reads every label. He will eat a whole thing of spinach every day. If he comes home to eat, he will be doubling down on what he gets at Purdue. It’s great to have Ben and Nick Six back.”

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