Spend an afternoon at Autzen Stadium on a football gameday, and you’re guaranteed to see the clip of Kenny Wheaton running back an interception for Oregon against Washington in 1994.
More than three decades later, his son is signing with the Ducks’ in-state rival.
Three-star cornerback Kai Wheaton signed with the Oregon State Beavers on Wednesday, OSU’s second acquisition of early National Signing Day.
Wheaton — hailing from Allen, Texas — is rated the No. 107 cornerback in the country and No. 177 player in Texas according to 247Sports’ composite rankings. He verbally committed to the Beavers in June and will stick with the program under new head coach JaMarcus Shephard.
Wheaton is also cousins with Markus Wheaton, the former Oregon State wide receiver from 2009-12 who was an all-Pac-12 first team selection in 2012 before a six-year NFL career.
OSU’s first signee of the three-day National Signing Day period was a flip early Wednesday morning, as Shephard and his staff convinced former South Alabama commit and three-star edge rusher Caleb Metzner to come to Corvallis.
The Beavers also signed former Ole Miss commit and three-star wide receiver Jameson Powell (Folsom, CA); three-star wide receiver Cynai Thomas (San Francisco, CA); three-star edge rusher Adel Dorr (Issaquah, WA); three-star tight end Landon Cook (Concord, CA); three-star linebackers Jeremiah Brown (San Jacinto, CA) and Lance McGee (Sumner, WA); and three-star athlete Jesse Legree (Baltimore, MD).
OSU has two other verbal commits in the 2026 class from Oregon: safety Deryk Farmer (Medford, OR); and athlete Rocco De La Rosa (Philomath, OR).