UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Josh Reaves made his way into the Bryce Jordan Center media room Monday afternoon sporting moccasins, sweats and the look of someone who was coming off a fitful nights sleep.
“Didn’t get much sleep last night,” the Nittany Lions’ defensive specialist admitted hours after Penn State’s 76-73 loss on the road to newly ranked No. 9 Purdue (24-5). “I just kept thinking about it over and over. I just wanted to know what I could’ve done better to help my team win that game.”
So Reaves stayed up after Penn State’s plane touched down at University Park Airport and waited for the game to replay on the Big Ten Network. Sitting at home in the wee hours of Monday morning he saw what everyone else inside Mackey Arena and those who tuned in elsewhere across the region witnessed.
This NCAA Tournament bubble team, with big man Mike Watkins limited for most of the game after he got in early foul trouble, has all the necessary pieces to make some legitimate noise come March. Yes, it has a budding star in sophomore point guard Tony Carr, the reigning Big Ten Player of the Week who dropped 30 points in the Lions’ victory last week against Ohio State. Yes, it also has a savvy veteran leader in senior Shep Garner, whose final home game will play out Wednesday night against No. 17 Michigan.
Add in a talented bench that complements a roster that has more athleticism, high-flying acrobatics and production than any that’s stepped on the BJC court during Chambers’ previous six years and this team has risen to new heights and in the process has become fun to watch. It’s a welcomed sight and a change of pace in Happy Valley as Penn State (19-10) will have every opportunity in the coming weeks to punch its first ticket to the NCAA Tournament since 2011.
But what Sunday night’s loss – one that could be categorized as agonizing and promising all at the same time -- further proved was that these Lions should they end up having a chance to dance will have to take the long way to get there. They’ll need wins this week against No. 17 Michigan (22-7) and another Sunday on the road against fellow bubble companion Nebraska (20-9). A strong showing to follow that up in the Big Ten Tournament would help them avoid having their bubble burst.
But nothing has come easy for this group, so why would the next few weeks be any different?
As college hoops guru Andy Katz put it Monday, the Lions – who received six votes in this week’s AP Poll marking the first time they’ve received votes since Week 8 of the 2014-15 season -- look like a tournament team but must first avoid a “face plant” this week. Sounds encouraging, right?
Well, Penn State hasn’t been here before with the season hanging in the balance right before their eyes, but for this group the lack of experience at this critical juncture doesn’t seem to matter much. For a crop of once highly-coveted prospects whose own college decisions left many asking ‘huh?’ and ‘why Penn State?’ there couldn’t be a more fitting group to take on this journey that could lead to a rewarding March.
“Moral victories really aren’t our thing anymore,” Reaves, a junior, said. “We’re a good basketball team. We can compete with people and we can compete until the end.”
Taking the season series from now No. 16 Ohio State (22-7) certainly helped prove that they can hang with upper echelon teams. Going back and forth with Purdue on the road in a rowdy environment without Watkins backed that notion once again. This isn’t the same team that lost to Rider and N.C. State early on in the season as the Lions are peaking at the right time.
Their only losses since Jan. 31 included a 76-68 defeat on the road against now No. 2 Michigan State (26-3) and Sunday’s three-point loss to Purdue. Whether or not their resume is good enough will be up for debate should they take care of business and control their own destiny this week and in the conference tournament.
Still, spend a little time around this team and it’s easy to see they actually believe what they’re saying, too. Heck, if they didn’t buy into this program when the wheels were basically falling off it when they committed here then they wouldn’t be in this position right now. This tournament chance after all is why these players defied a lot of odds to come here.
“It takes a lot of courage and a lot of guts to want to take a program and to choose a different path,” Pat Chambers said on Monday. “Not that going where everyone is winning is an easy path, it’s not. You still got to be great, but to come here where you haven’t been to a tournament in a couple years and you are building (isn’t easy).”
Nothing about this team coming together or this tournament chance has been or will be easy. It’s a fitting combination.
Reaves, the former Oak Hill (Va.) Academy standout, chose Penn State at a time when there was only a vision to buy into and a coach in Chambers whose recruiting pitch wasn’t similar to what Reaves heard from other suitors.
While others heaped compliments his way and told him how talented he was, Chambers would message him after his high school games and tell him what he needed to do to get better.
“Every time with coach Chambers it was like, ‘Why don’t you try doing this? Or, how about you try that,’” Reaves recalled Monday. Before Reaves, Penn State had never recruited the Virginia basketball powerhouse. But still, he jumped in head first and chose this route anyway. “I could feel the love all the way from Virginia and that was something that I never felt before.”
The Philly trio of sophomores Carr, Lamar Stevens and Nazeer Bostick were key components to this program’s turnaround too and Carr has undoubtedly become the team’s best player. But, perhaps nobody embodies this team and the long journey it’s been on to make it this far more than the senior Garner.
And, without Garner who knows if Penn State even lands Carr & Co. who all went to the same Philadelphia high school?
Garner was the first Roman Catholic player to sign with Penn State during Chambers’ tenure, the one who led the way for the trio to follow. Garner believed the pitch he heard that he’d have a chance to help build something special.
“He had many other options other than Penn State but he chose Penn State,” Chambers said. “He chose to take the hard route, the road less traveled. You have to commend him on that. He too could’ve left (in the offseason) in this world that we live in in men’s basketball and he did not. He believed in what we were doing and he wanted to see this thing through. … That’s a guy I’m always going to refer to and say, ‘Hey, this is what this guy did. He paid his dues. He’s earned the right to be shooting 45 percent from three. He’s earned the right to find this success.’ ”
It was a trail to Penn State that Philadelphia native DJ Newbill started when he transferred to Penn State from Southern Mississippi after his freshman season in 2010-2011, but unlike Newbill, this was Garner’s first and only stop.
“The courage Shep had to say yes was huge,” Chambers said. “DJ opened the door (to Philadelphia) and Shep threw that thing wide open.”
The chance to experience an NCAA Tournament run would be the ultimate reward for a team that took a gamble on a program that they willingly wanted to try and change. It hasn’t been easy, but what this team has shown in the past four weeks as they’ve won six of their last eight games is that Penn State’s program is headed down the right path.
That transformation hasn’t happened over night. Those fitful nights of rest that Chambers used to have during the past few years as he tried to make his team the best it could be by the end of the season -- even knowing with most of those groups that it still wouldn’t be good enough to compete every night in the Big Ten – those restless nights rubbed off on players like Garner, Reaves and Carr.
They’re the ones who now try and figure out how to make this thing just right so that heartbreaking losses like Sunday night, ones that kept Reaves up all night dissecting film, don’t come back to bite them when the selection committee looks at their final resume and decides whether or not they’re worthy of a long-awaited tournament bid.