Jay Paterno doubles down on NIL stance

The departure of former head basketball coach Micah Shrewsberry has caused a lot of concern in the State College community for several reasons, namely regarding NIL. Before leaving Penn State basketball, Shrewsberry claimed that the Nittany Lions were towards the bottom of the Big Ten in NIL finding and more, which was holding him and his program back. Following his departure, Jay Paterno — the son of legendary coach Joe Paterno — fired back at Shrewsberry’s statements, claiming the university met all of his demands. Recently, Jay Paterno doubled down on his stance on Penn State University NIL funding.

Jay Paterno doubles down on his stance regarding Penn State University NIL funding

Despite a short Twitter spat with Penn State football legend Michael Mauti, Jay Paterno is standing ten toes on his previous statements that the university is doing everything right regarding NIL. Whether or not anyone believes him is a topic for another day.

“Micah Shrewsberry, before he left, said that we are 14th in the Big Ten in NIL,” Jay Paterno said on Happy Valley Insider Podcast. “There is no way for him to know that, because these numbers aren’t disclosed publicly. Every one of his scholarship players was on a contract before last season, because we were trying to help keep some guys here, to help give them some money. And so, you know, the things that [the basketball program] asked for were all met — at the end of the day, Micah Shrewsberry made a decision to leave because he wanted to go home, and he made that very clear. Any other speculation is people just trying to stir some things up when there really isn’t anything there.”

Following these statements, Jay Paterno continued to reiterate that the school and athletic department met every demand that Shrewsberry had of them.

“Everything he asked for, [the university] met every ask that he made. In terms of NIL asks that they made, not only did [the school] meet it, but they exceeded it in less than 48 hours … I think every body needs to stop talking about the guy who left (Shrewsberry) and needs to start talking about the guy who is here (Mike Rhoades)”

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