Shane Thomas | The Valdosta Daily TimesBerrien running back Ken Bennett, center, sits with his family and members of the Berrien coaching staff after signing with Clarke College on Friday.

NASHVILLE, Ga. –– A fourth Berrien Rebel football player signed a college football scholarship on Friday.

Senior running back Ken Bennett signed a letter of intent to attend Clarke College in Dubuque, Iowa –– joining standouts Ja’Marquis Johnson, Jaden Wheeler and Gavin Purvis as the first Rebels to sign college scholarships in two years.

“It means a lot –– I’ve never thought I’d be there, but it happened,” Bennett said of signing with Clarke. “I’m excited to go play for them next year and see what I can do.”

The 5-foot-6, 165-pound Bennett had 83 carries for 365 yards and four touchdowns for the Rebels last season, with one 100-yard rushing game –– doing so playing through a broken thumb for a stretch of the season. During the 2018 season, Bennett carried the ball 154 times for a team-best 834 yards with nine touchdowns and four 100-yard rushing games.

Bennett impressed enough to start for the Rebels as a freshman and has been a cornerstone of the team his entire career at Berrien.

“I was able to play as a freshman, so I got to play a little earlier and it made me develop faster,” Bennett said of starting games early in his career. “I feel like that helped me out a lot.”

This fall, Bennett will officially be traded the heat, humidity and mercurial weather patterns of South Georgia for the colder Iowa climate.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle,” Bennett said of the weather changes. “I feel like I’m gonna get through it either way. I’ll get through anything, that’s how I feel, so it ain’t gonna be anything to hard to handle.”

Once there, Bennett will join the Pride, led by head coach Miguel Regalado.

The football program at Clarke is still very much in its infancy. In fact, Regalado became the team’s first head coach on March 27, 2017.

“All the stuff is brand new,” Bennett said when asked what sold him on Clarke. “I like the way the coaches were talking to me, how they were willing to do things, the players –– I talked to some of the players. I just liked it all.”

Naturally, the first year for the Pride was a struggle. The team finished just 2-9 in its inaugural season in 2019, with a 2-3 record in the Heart of America Conference in NAIA Division I.

Bennett figures to bolster the Pride’s rushing attack after the team posted just two rushing touchdowns in 11 games last season. Offensively, the Pride threw for 14 touchdowns and averaged just 214 total yards per game on average.

One thing Bennett says Regalado told him on his visit was that student comes first, athlete second.

“First, they told me to get serious about getting my degree,” Bennett said of his early talks with Regalado. “Then, he knows a lot about me and he’s seen my film. He saw me on special teams, he saw me on kickoff returns, going down and making tackles, but he wants me to play tailback for them.”

Despite his smallish stature, Bennett has surprising strength and elusiveness at running back that made him a game-changer for the Rebels over his four-year career.

A self-starter, Bennett was one of the team’s leaders by example and often sought out by coaches to demonstrate things to younger players during practice.

“Ken is one of those kids that, when you look at him, he doesn’t look like a whole lot,” Berrien head coach Tim Alligood said. “He’s small in stature, but he’s got one of the biggest hearts of anybody I’ve ever coached. From Day 1, Ken was one of those kids that you didn’t have to stay on him like you do some kids. He just had that natural internal drive. 

“He was also pound-for-pound the strongest kid at the GACA Weightlifting Competition last year. Pound-for-pound, he was our strongest kid on our team at 160 pounds. Ken’s just a self-driven guy, he loves to play the game –– started his first varsity game as a freshman here at Berrien andI know he’s gonna do good things at Clarke College in Iowa.”

Bennett’s football journey is taking him 1,061 miles from his home in Nashville –– 16 hours and 42 minutes to be exact.

After his signing on Friday, Bennett admits he’ll always have a special place in his heart for the red and silver of Berrien County. The senior vows to pop up at Raymond Jones Memorial Stadium to root for his underclassmen teammates and see his family when he gets the chance.

“Berrien County will always mean a lot to me,” Bennett said. “I’ll always come back to this place, no matter what. I’ll probably come back every now and then to watch the players I played with that were under me and see what they’re doing.”