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basketball Edit

Lions shuffling staff for '17-'18

Penn State basketball is seeking a new assistant coach for the 2017-18 season.

Six weeks after head coach Patrick Chambers spoke to reporters for a year-end press conference, detailing a post-season evaluation process in which he planned to seek out any and every avenue in which the program can take steps forward, an assistant coaching vacancy was listed early Monday morning to the university’s job listing site.

Chambers met with reporters in the team's conference room last month.
Chambers met with reporters in the team's conference room last month.

The job description is as follows:

“Penn State Intercollegiate Athletics, a Division 1 and Big Ten Conference Institution is seeking candidates for the job of Assistant Coach, Men’s Basketball. Assist with coaching the Men’s Basketball Team, with particular regard for planning, organizing and conducting team practices. Assist in game preparations, strategies and game management. Plan, organize and conduct recruiting campaigns. Coordinate game and tournament arrangements. Develop new techniques and strategies. Assist in conducting clinics and workshops.

“Typically requires a Bachelor's degree or higher plus two years of related experience. NBA or NCAA Div 1 Coaching experience required. Proven organizational, evaluation, administrative, and communication skills; a demonstrated ability to work well under pressure; and knowledge of NCAA regulations also required. This is a fixed-term appointment funded for one year from date of hire with excellent possibility of re-funding.”

The vacancy comes as a result of a staff shuffling that will move Ross Condon back to a director of operations position that he held the previous four years before being promoted into an assistant coaching role in May 2015. A former walk-on at Villanova, Condon spent two years as director of ops at Radford before joining Chambers’ staff at Boston University and then following him then to Penn State.

Early indications are that the assistant coaching position change has been done in an effort to bring in a fresh perspective to the program, given that Chambers has long histories and relationships throughout the staff, and will be filled sometime in the next six weeks. As the official job posting indicates, coaching experience at the NCAA D1 or NBA level is required, with initial signs pointing toward head coaching experience being the preference.

The move comes on the heels of a 15-18 season for the program in the first season of action for Tony Carr, Lamar Stevens and Mike Watkins, each of whom emerged as major contributors in their debuts. In the aftermath of the up-and-down campaign, the program recently welcomed true freshmen Trent Buttrick, John Harrar and Jamari Wheeler to fill out the roster.

Chambers and the Lions have started their allotment of 10 summer practices in anticipation of an August foreign tour that will send the program to the Bahamas for three exhibition games.

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