I think a better way to express this is that a replacement-

level AD should have been able to make this hire. PSU is a terrible basketball program. They have been to 10 tournaments in program history. They have never been to two consecutive tournaments. Not counting a one season stint by his predecessor, their last coach made zero tournament in nine seasons. The program is so bad, he was still allowed to have the job for nine seasons. The previous coach had one tournament in eight seasons. Prior to that, that guy went to one tournament in eight seasons.

In the past two years, Shrewsberry landed two 4 stars among 8 recruits. Only one of them was a top 100 recruit. And he was a revered legacy. You have to go back to 2016 for the last time PSU landed a four-star recruit. He has no commitments lined up for 2025. Who in their right mind would want to recruit at Penn State?

I don't care what PSU was offering outside of compensation. Any respectable school offering similar money ought to be able to land a PSU coach. If Jack couldn't get this done, it would have been a major failure. I also note that I'm not aware of a coach ever getting an initial seven-year deal. Six years seems to be the industry standard. At first blush, that seems like a length that shouldn't be necessary to land a coach in Shrewsberry's position.

That doesn't mean there isn't reason to be excited and like the hire. Of course there is. There's reason to be optimistic based on his background. People are projecting that into an expectation that he will recruit well based on how respected he is and the connections he has in Indiana. And the optimistic view is that we're just seeing his hard work click with the late run they've had. But I wouldn't call this a home run. We still don't know if he's going to be a good recruiter. I don't know if he'll be as good as McDermott, who has landed a decent number of four star recruits lately. Hopefully he parlays hit hot hand into some success on the trail.