Penn State basketball G Kanye Clary is returning to the school for a second season, he tweeted Thursday afternoon.
YEAR 2 OTW #WEARE 🦁 pic.twitter.com/47hPWdFIPw
— Kanye Clary (@Kanyeclary) April 13, 2023
Clary’s return shouldn’t come as a surprise.
Despite five of his teammates entering the transfer portal, including classmates Kebba Njie, Evan Mahaffey and Jameel Brown, Clary didn’t put his name in the portal.
Clary came to Penn State before last season as a three-star recruit from Massanutten Military Academy in Woodstock, Virginia. In his first season, Clary came off the bench and provided Penn State depth at point guard behind Jalen Pickett. Clary finished Year 1 averaging 3.7 points and 10.4 minutes per game. He scored in double figures four times, posting a season and career-high with 17 in a loss at Maryland Feb. 11.
Clary was the first high school player to commit to Penn State in the Micah Shrewsberry era. That era ended last month after two seasons when Shrewsberry accepted the head coaching job at Notre Dame. Penn State doesn’t have a lot of holdovers from the Shrewsberry era. Seven seniors will be gone and five more players are in the portal as mentioned above. Clary and classmate Demetrius Lilley are the only scholarship players from last year’s team. New coach Mike Rhoades will be adding two of his players from VCU. A-10 Player of the Year Ace Baldwin announced his commitment to Penn State on Easter Sunday and Nick Kern did the same late Wednesday night.
Penn State has almost enough scholarship players (four) to form a team of scholarship players. Luckily, there’s plenty of time for Rhoades and his staff to add, which it will do before the season starts and November.
