Can Penn State keep both RBs? How is NIL going? Nittany Lions mailbag (2024)

We’re just over three months from the season opener. Soon enough, we’ll be at Big Ten media days wondering where the offseason went. Let’s cut right to it.

Note: Questions have been lightly edited.

Is there too much hype? Not enough? Just the right amount? Help me manage my expectations! — JT F.

The beauty of this time of year is that most fan bases should be feeling good. Everyone is undefeated. We’ve talked ourselves into reasons our teams will be great, then tried to convince ourselves that any flaws or weaknesses are overblown. We’ve put on our emotional blinders. As a sports fan, I do this all the time.

But this offseason should feel a little different from the last few for Penn State fans. You should be embracing the hype. Winning the Rose Bowl to cap last season at 11-2 with young players playing an integral role — that latter part being critical to all this — should have many of you feeling a little happier, a little more optimistic. This is a preseason top-10 team. I believe that. The Nittany Lions should be able to push Ohio State and Michigan, but I’m not so sure they can overtake them … yet. But that gap should be closing this season and next. Manage the hype of having a team that should have a double-digit win total, but believe that if this roster develops and hits its stride, Penn State is well positioned in the next two seasons to make some serious, College Football Playoff-level noise.

Season Opener.
Saturday Night.
Happy Valley.#WeAre pic.twitter.com/2tfWI4ru3n

— Penn State Football (@PennStateFball) May 6, 2023

There is plenty of talent on a roster that just might include three first-round draft picks in next year’s NFL Draft. You’ve seen these running backs. Nick Singleton and Kaytron Allen are special talents. If Penn State had one of them, you would feel great about that position. Two? It’s a luxury.

Abdul Carter is the most-hyped sophom*ore linebacker around here since Micah Parsons, and rightfully so. Carter’s future looks extremely bright. And I haven’t even gotten to the quarterback yet.

This year it’s time to see why Drew Allar picked up that fifth star as a recruit. All of the glimpses from last season, on the field and behind the scenes as he developed, will come into focus. Every fan base wants its team to sign a five-star quarterback. Penn State did that, and pretty soon it’s time to see if he’s the guy teammates, coaches and fans believe he is. There’s excitement in that but also some unknowns.

We haven’t seen Allar in critical moments. How does he respond after throwing the inevitable interception? When defenses try to confuse him, how quickly can he decipher it and adjust? His processing ability has been raved about behind the scenes, but now we have to see it in real time with 100,000-plus people in the stands.

The receiving corps and defensive tackles are reasons for concern. Penn State at least addressed the receiver position, but D-tackle will be a storyline until the Lions aren’t getting blown off the ball. We can’t forget about last year in Ann Arbor when there was too much freelancing, according to defensive coordinator Manny Diaz.

Enjoy the hype, but also understand Ohio State and Michigan are feeling really good right about now, too.

If someone asked me, “Hey, how’s Penn State football doing with that NIL thing?” how should I answer them? (Other than, “Well, it’s complicated …”) — Michael S.

“Complicated” is a perfect way to put it. NIL around here is a world driven by non-disclosure agreements, of contracts few want to share and the occasional in-fighting among Penn State’s own collectives.

Penn State is making progress with NIL. It’s better now than it was a year ago. Both collectives that serve football, Success With Honor (football and all sports) and Lions Legacy Club (football only), have been more visible and seemingly more active with events and with the promotion of those events in the past few months. Visibility is important, and it was lacking at times this past year, as fans were unsure what collectives were and as the collectives attempted to figure out how to operate in this ever-changing space.

Collectives are trying to find different ways to serve the athletes. How creative this gets likely will be the next frontier of this NIL era. An interesting idea I’ve heard around here focuses on trying to secure housing for players’ families for game weekends. Hotels are extremely overpriced and booked out a year in advance. Could a collective reduce that financial burden by figuring out how to offer housing accommodations for families as an NIL perk? Certainly, that’s a way to make it more enticing for an out-of-state player to consider Penn State.

Is anything planned to improve the aesthetics of Beaver Stadium with the upcoming upgrades? It’s the ugliest eye sore I’ve ever seen. I love the team but hate the look of the stadium. What a monstrosity! —Patrick M.

One would hope so, but nothing is official on that front just yet. And here’s why: The first priority with the Beaver Stadium renovation is taking care of the stadium’s maintenance issues. That was part of the $70 million athletics asked for at the Board of Trustees meeting in early May. The rest of that money will be used for permits, design costs and consultant expenses. The design phase, which is expected to start in June, could take up to a year.

So at the moment, nothing is finalized with the stadium design-wise because they’re working through concepts. The original facility master plan included that updated brick exterior, but what was presented related to Beaver Stadium in that master plan in 2017 doesn’t matter anymore.

The proposed construction timeline now, which focuses on the stadium’s west side (press box side), tentatively is slated to begin in January 2025 and be completed in August 2027. I’ll be sure to pass along more details once we have them.

My question is hypothetical: Had Penn State held on to beat Ohio State in 2017 and 2018, how would that have changed the current state of the program? Meaning, where do you think we would be right now had we beaten OSU three times in a row? — Tom L.

The loss in 2017 was crippling. That’s the one I always think about more when I look back at those games. Penn State had that game, on the road with a special roster, and still couldn’t get it done. That’s a gut punch.

I’ll tweak your hypothetical because taking even two of those three games would’ve been massive. Three of them and we’re talking about a team that elevates into another stratosphere with recruiting, and that’s saying something because Penn State has recruited well.

Now, we can also play the hypothetical game and debate what happens if Penn State makes the Playoff in 2016 after beating Ohio State and then Wisconsin in the Big Ten title game. That also could’ve been a massive moment in this program’s history. When you can pitch a Playoff appearance to recruits, that’s special.

Penn State would’ve been one of the biggest beneficiaries if the Playoff had been 12 teams from its inception, and those key moments swing the projections of programs for years to come. Instead, it’s been a series of close what ifs, and that’s a tough pill to swallow. The Lions were right there, but at the end of the day, they have one massive upset and two one-point losses to show for it.

How frank and earnest are the coaches with a kid on the losing end of a position battle? With the uproar over Coach Prime’s cuts at Colorado, I’m really curious how different the standard operating procedure is at Penn State. — Walter N.

One of the interesting things that happens with Penn State’s cornerbacks is position coach Terry Smith has his players rank themselves on the board in their meeting room. I found it fascinating when Smith mentioned this a few years ago. It’s a straightforward way to do it so players know where their peers and coaches see them.

That’s probably also why Storm Duck left this spring after it became clear that Kalen King and Johnny Dixon are the two top corners. So, they lost a player because of transparency, but that probably appeals to a lot of other transfers and recruits.

Now, we’re all fooling ourselves if we think teams don’t try to run off players who haven’t panned out. It happens everywhere. There are nudges out the door. Certainly not at the same level that’s happening at Colorado, but it’s part of the business of this sport. It’s different with every position group, and while Penn State stopped releasing a depth chart, citing competitive reasons, players absolutely know where they stand. It’s addressed at their end-of-season meetings and again in their post-spring meetings — hence the portal entrants that usually follow.

Who is one under-the-radar player who’s not expected to be in a starting rotation on each side of the ball that could be an impact player once October comes around? — Matt L.

Offense: Wide receiver Omari Evans.

He might play himself into a starting role, but in my mind, the top three right now are KeAndre Lambert-Smith, Harrison Wallace III and Dante Cephas. Evans was a quarterback in high school, so I wouldn’t have been surprised if he took a redshirt, but he caught on quickly. There’s plenty of youth in the receiving corps, and lots of reps are up for grabs. The sophom*ore will probably be a significant contributor this year.

Defense: Linebacker Tony Rojas.

The staff thinks of Dani Dennis-Sutton as a starter so I won’t pick him, even though he technically might not be a starter. Rojas is intriguing. He changed his body shortly after enrolling, and the blueprint is there for freshman linebackers to contribute right away. We’ve seen it happen many times before, and Rojas is one of those freshmen who will likely make an impact early on special teams, then parlay it into a role on defense. Physically, he already looks like an athletic linebacker — and that’s after gaining 29 pounds from January to April.

What are the chances Penn State can keep both running backs after this season? — Craig B.

I don’t think it’s that big of a worry, honestly. Both seem happy and bought in, and they’re productive. Singleton is a Pennsylvania guy, and playing close to home was important to him. Allen is from Norfolk, Va. Part of Penn State’s recruiting pitch to running backs is that they’re not going to take as much of a pounding here because they rotate so much. That’s appealing when one thinks about getting to the NFL as healthy as possible, all while eying that second contract. Most players probably don’t think of it as fans do — that their stats might take a hit because of the rotation. As long as both keep producing, it’s not likely to be an issue. And winning also helps keep everyone happy.

(Photo: Matthew O’Haren / USA Today)

Audrey Snyder has covered Penn State since 2012 for various outlets, including The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Patriot-News and DKPittsburghSports. Snyder is an active member of the Association for Women in Sports Media (AWSM) and is the professional adviser for Penn State’s student chapter. Follow Audrey on Twitter @audsnyder4