The up and down season for the Penn State men’s basketball programs after news was released that their leading scorer, [autotag]Kanye Clary[/autotag], was no longer part of the team after comments from head coach [autotag]Mike Rhoades[/autotag] on Monday.
“Kanye’s no longer with the team. Coach’s decision. We’re going to just keep moving forward with and focus on the guys we got, the task at hand,” Rhoades said at the Bryce Jordan Center.
This shocking turn of events comes after the sophomore guard didn’t make the trip to Nebraska on Saturday where the Nittany Lions lost 68-49. He is now no longer on their online roster after Rhoades’ comments.
Clary was one of the biggest surprises in the Big Ten this year, becoming one of the conference’s top scorers before an injury caused him to miss two games. He returned in a bench role for the next three games.
During his absence, Penn State won games over Rutgers and Indiana on the road. They also beat Iowa at home when Clary returned from injury but lost against Northwestern and Michigan State.
This announcement comes at a strange time in the season.
The Nittany Lions only have five more games remaining before the Big Ten tournament begins and will need a Cinderella type of run to get back into March Madness.
At the time of his dismissal, Clary was averaging 16.7 points, 2.9 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game.
“Next man up. Let’s continue to build this the right way, work really hard, keep putting it together,” Rhoades said.
Whether this is a direct shot at the sophomore guard is unknown, but it’s peculiar messaging after someone as talented at Clary was dismissed.
He was a holdover from Micah Shrewsberry’s first Penn State recruiting class after he decided to stay in Happy Valley upon the hiring of Rhoades. It seemed like things were working out early as he improved just about every aspect of his game from year one to year two.
Now, [autotag]Ace Baldwin[/autotag] will be the feature guard with [autotag]D’Marco Dunn[/autotag] and [autotag]Jameel Brown[/autotag] getting more playing time in the backcourt.
How this impacts the team will be seen, but it’s a shocking announcement at this point in the year.
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