Penn State is coming out of a season where they had two of their edge rushers get drafted by NFL teams over the weekend.
While [autotag]Chop Robinson[/autotag] and [autotag]Adisa Isaac[/autotag] will certainly be difficult to replace, their losses are lessened by the return of [autotag]Dani Dennis-Sutton[/autotag] and [autotag]Abdul Carter[/autotag] moving to defensive end.
As has become the norm for the Nittany Lions under the past few years under defensive coordinator Manny Diaz, they rotated many players across their defensive line throughout a game.
That’s likely going to continue with new defensive coordinator [autotag]Tom Allen[/autotag].
So while it’s nice to have the returning production of Dennis-Sutton and Carter taking on a new role, they’ll still need other players to produce for them to operate like they have in the past.
According to Tyler Donohue of 247Sports, he’s expecting [autotag]Jameial Lyons[/autotag] to have a breakout season this year based on what he’s hearing coming out of spring practices (subscription required).
At 6-foot-5 and 250 pounds, he certainly has the frame to be able to compete against Big Ten competition.
Lyons didn’t get much opportunity during his freshman season in 2023 because of how experienced the defensive line room was, but he still has loads of potential based on his four-star rating coming out of high school.
Donohue said that the coaching staff told him that they were confident he would have been able to handle a larger workload if it weren’t for the depth in front of him.
Instead, he was limited to 95 defensive snaps.
Lyons should have plenty of opportunities this season to showcase what he can do and [autotag]James Franklin[/autotag] seems to think he’ll take that opportunity, saying that the sophomore has “got a bright future.”
He’ll certainly one to continue monitoring throughout the summer and during the early part of the year.