Wins need to come.
After one of the most disgusting seasons in all of college basketball last season, Penn State finds itself in a very interesting position heading into the 2026-27 season. On both sides of the basketball, it doesn't exactly feel like Penn State is a great team by any means, but there are some things to be mindful of.
It feels like head coach Mike Rhoades might have actually put together a decent roster, at least the best that he can with what he's working with. Ultimately, unfortunately, a lot of this doesn't really fall on Rhoades.
He hasn't been given the necessary tools to win at a very high level, and as a result, Penn State has arguably been the worst Power Four team in the country over the past few seasons. Last year was a new low for the program and something that obviously needs to change over the next couple of months.
Saying that the team looks better during the summer and fall doesn't really change a whole lot for most Penn State fans. At the end of the day, a lot of fans want to see this team winning games at a high level, and until it does so, there are going to be rightful questions about whether it even has a chance to do it.
However, when speaking to reporters recently, it feels like the vibes are a bit different in Happy Valley when it comes to the basketball program. Rhoades said a lot of good things about how he thinks his team will look, and that's a step in the right direction compared to years past.
“This group so far, all summer, all fall, they've been a blast to be around and a blast to coach. We have a little bit of everything,” Rhoades said, per The Daily Collegian. “We got some young guys, we got some older guys, got some skilled guys, we got some big athletic guys and we have good character, good bones right now — but it's early, and there's not much adversity.”
“Best shooting team I've had since I've been here. It's probably one of the best shooting teams I've had since I was at Rice,” Rhoades said. “If you have guys that can really shoot it like Brant (Byers) and Roberts (Blums) and Thomas (Allard) and Josh (Reed), then you can't really help off those guys.”
I'm still a bit skeptical that things are going to go as planned for Penn State this year when it comes to the basketball side of things, considering that the Big Ten has some of the best teams in America and a lot of those teams are paying tens of millions of dollars to fund these teams and have a chance to win, but in the simple sense that Penn State should be better than it was a year ago, there's a lot to like.
