If you’re of the belief that Micah Shrewsberry’s first season as Penn State’s head basketball coach, which drew to a close with Friday’s loss to Purdue in the quarterfinals of the Big Ten Tournament, was an indication that the Nittany Lions have brighter hoops days ahead, there are plenty of signs you can point to.
You might want to give it just one more year, though.
Though it’s true that Penn State will, once again, not be participating in the NCAA Tournament, or even the NIT, it was still hard to be unimpressed by the body of work Shrewsberry and his new staff put together, particularly with a roster that was, by no fault of their own, rather hastily assembled less than one year ago.
With six returning players – only four of which saw more than two minutes per game last season – and five transfers, Penn State won 14 games, including nine against Big Ten opponents. There were some ugly nights, to be sure – the lopsided loss at UMass in November, the ugly late-season home defeat to Nebraska (that didn’t look QUITE as bad when the Cornhuskers then won at Ohio State and Wisconsin) – and a few games where Shrewsberry wishes he had one or two possessions back. And the offense, which produced 64.6 points per game (dead last in the conference) managed to have at least a few ugly moments most nights.
