Penn State Basketball: Are Nittany Lions a legitimate NCAA contender?

The Vitals

Bench

Brockington is the main reason that Penn State has one of the most productive bench units in the nation. The Nittany Lions reserves rank 36th in the nation in scoring at 27.3 points a game on 44% shooting along with three 3-pointers a game on 30.4% from beyond the arc. They are also are getting 12.4 rebounds, 4.1 assists, 2.3 steals, and 1.3 blocks out of their second unit.

Brockington, who sat out last season after transferring from St. Bonaventure, was superb against Iowa, knocking down nine of 15 shots from the field and five of seven of his free throw attempts.  The 6-4 sophomore guard has scored 10 or more points on nine occasions and is averaging 15 points on 60% shooting from the floor over his last three games.

Jones is a streaky shooter who was red-hot against the Hawkeyes, connecting on six of nine shots from the field and four of six from downtown. The performance snapped a two-game stretch where the grad transfer totaled just six points as he missed 11 of 14 shots, including all seven of his three-point tries. Jones has reached double-figures four times, and each time, the 6-4 guard made at least two three-pointers.

Defense

Chambers has always been a head coach who has hung his hat on the defensive side of the ball, but this year’s team has the potential to be the best of all his teams. While the Nittany Lions start the game with a traditional lineup, they can go small and put pressure on the ball.  PSU can create turnovers and turn defense.

The Nittany Lions have been ranked among the top-35 teams in KenPom’s defensive rankings in each of the last three years. While this year’s squad is currently 31st, which is lower than the previous two seasons when they finished 19th (2018) and 27th (2019) in the rankings, their 90.1 rating is significantly better than those two seasons.

The Nittany Lions are allowing 67.4 points a game (146th), although they are limiting their opponents to just 39.3% (57th) shooting from the field including 41.6% (15th) on two-point attempts. They do have issues, however, as they don’t defend the 3-point line well and only an average defensive rebounding team as they collect 72.4% of all defensive rebounds. Fouls are also an issue.

Watkins and Stevens have been one of the best defenders in the Big Ten. Point guard Jamari Wheeler, Brockington, and John Harrar also have done an excellent job defensively. Jones and Seth Lundy have shown improvement on that end lately as well.