Big Ten Basketball preseason power rankings: Where Does Penn State stand?
By Evan Smith
We’ve already taken our crack at the starting 5, but this is a team with a lot of conference experience from John Harrar and My Dread but almost entirely new faces at every other position.
This is a work in progress for Shrewsberry, and he shouldn’t be judged too harshly for his results this season.
However, it’s fair to ask how much higher this ranking would be with Myreon Jones, Jamari Wheeler, Izaiah Brockington, etc…
It’s weird to see a program with such basektball history BELOW Penn State in the rankings, but expectations are not high for Minnesota coming into the 2021-2022 season.
Hiring Ben Johnson to replace Richard Pitino (who replaced Tubby Smith) signaled a clear re-direction from the Golden Gopher program.
Likely starting four transfers, which could, gulp, be more than Penn State (!) means this is a rebuilding year for Minnesota.
Seems like just yesterday we saw head coach Fred Hoiberg incredibly sick on the sidelines of the Big Ten Conference Tournament, first game as the COVID-19 pandemic was starting in earnest (he never tested positive, to be clear).
Nebraska had covid issues last year as well and struggled just to get all their games in.
Brothers Trey and Bryce McGowen will play a lot of minutes and make for a fun color commentary reminder during the game, but Nebraska doesn’t have much to look forward to this year.