Dave Jones:
1. Chambers and his staff are showing signs of really being able to recruit.
The class just signed in the fall, including 4-star big guard Josh Reaves and 4-star power forward Mike Watkins and 3-star Lithuanian wing bomber Deividas Zemgulis has the look of a difference-maker. I’m hearing raves about Reaves in particular of the sort I heard about Talor Battle back in 2007 – total package of terrific player and leadership personality.
When your staff puts in the leg work to build relationships up and down the vital I-95 corridor and then that work starts bearing fruit, it’s tough to pull the plug. It would be even a better sign had not Reaves’ Oak Hill Academy teammate Joe Hampton from the 2015 class not backed out of his verbal last month.
2. The Nittany Lions played hard through the end of the season despite the results.
Usually you see some sort of dysfunction by March when a team endures as much losing as Penn State did. But the fact that the Nits played a lot of their best basketball in their last four games says something to how the players at least have bought in to what Chambers is selling.
Penn State went 3-1 from the last regular-season game through three games in the Big Ten tournament. During that period, they really emptied the tank in what could have been viewed as a hopeless situation. Significantly, they did so after Barbour gave Chambers a pair of public votes of confidence, one after the Lions’ worst game of the year – a 60-39 loss at Northwestern.
3. Penn State has not played defense this consistently and well since the Bruce Parkhill era.
That means something because it’s a constant, a base to work from that doesn’t fluctuate. It’s why PSU was so close in so many games.
The Lions were ranked 54th in defensive efficiency among the nation’s 351 Division I teams, 7th of 14 in the Big Ten, by Ken Pomeroy’s tempo-free stats. They did this while playing the fastest pace in the Big Ten.
Strictly speaking, one has nothing to do with the other. But only from a standpoint of personality, you don’t often see a team that plays up-tempo on offense and still locks down every possession on defense.
via About Patrick Chambers contract extension and why Sandy Barbour was smart to do it | PennLive.com.