Penn State Basketball announces series with UMass: Trent Buttrick Revenge Game?

Penn State Basketball has scheduled a “home and home” series with the University of Massachusettes, starting in Amherst this season, according to CBS Sports’ Jon Rothstein.

This is normally the time of year where these multi-year contracts start to be leaked or announced so expect to see a few more of these in the coming weeks.

UMass is a fun opponent from back in Penn State Basketball’s days in the Atlantic 10 Conference.

The Minuteman went 8-7 in the 2020-2021 COVID-19 shortened season, finishing 6-4 in the Atlantic 10.  They defeated St. Joe’s in the first round of the Atlantic 10 Championships before falling 68-72 to NIT Tournament team St. Louis in the quarterfinals.

Penn State Basketball holds a 10-13 record all time against UMass, but their last game was in 1991, so let’s not read too much into that.  What could make this match-up more fun is that former Penn State forward Trent Buttrick transferred to UMass a few weeks ago after entering the Transfer Portal following the firing of Pat Chambers and hiring of Micah Shrewsberry.  Buttrick, the 6’8″ forward from Bloomsburg, PA, averaged 3.0 points and 3.0 rebounds per game, playing 13.3 minutes.

While it would be nice to see Buttrick in the BJC again this season, fans will have to settle for watching him on tv against his old team.  Dates, times and networks have yet to be announced.