As Shrewsberry’s Stock Rises, So Might Kraft’s Need to Be Proactive

As longtime Notre Dame head coach Mike Brey announced on Thursday night he would retire at the end of the season, the natural curiosity of who the Irish might replace him with rose to the forefront of the college basketball corners of the internet. While speculative list-making does not create genuine interest where none might exist, Penn State coach Micah Shrewsberry was — among others — conversationally named as a potential candidate.

Whether or not Notre Dame is actually interested in Shrewsberry or vice versa is a different conversation all together. Broadly, Notre Dame presents an easier path to the NCAA Tournament with a slightly less formidable conference schedule. The Irish also boast a sizable alumni base, media pull and brand power equal to any of the biggest names in college athletics. If that is a step up, sideways or down from Penn State is a question only Shrewsberry can answer for himself.

None of this is to say speculation should be taken as fact, but it does present new Penn State Athletic Director Pat Kraft with a unique situation. Generally, Penn State men’s basketball coaches have not been hot commodities. Former head coach Pat Chambers was offered a few jobs over the years, but none that enticed him away from his climb towards something more at Penn State. Ed DeChellis left on his own accord, and the likes of Jerry Dunn and Bruce Parkhill both undoubtedly had opportunities arise, but the coaching carousal landscape was different then than it is today.

If nothing else, the point remains: Penn State hasn’t ever really had to fight to keep its coach.

Which is the ironic part for Penn State men’s basketball in 2023. When former Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics Sandy Barbour put up the money [Penn State does not disclose the contract information of its men’s basketball coach] to hire Shrewsberry, it marked a moment when Penn State had hired a basketball coach it might actually have to worry about losing to a better program. The perfect Penn State men’s basketball tragedy would be to finally invest in a head coach of Shrewsberry’s ilk, only for him to leave for greener pastures.

Enter, again, Kraft.

“I’m committed to keeping our [coaches],” Kraft said near the end of 2022. “Micah is a really really, really good coach. Now, here’s what I will tell you and I said this before I got up here. It’s not just about paying the coach, and the great coaches know that it’s about keeping staff, being able to hire staff, which is part of the process, it’s also about putting the infrastructure behind them to be successful. Where can I recruit, how do I recruit? How do I feed my athletes? How do I keep my athletes healthy, that infrastructure, which I think is lacked for a lot of our sports. […] So paying your coach is great, but the great coaches understand it’s all the other stuff that helps you eventually win the national championship.”

The infrastructure might be the biggest day-to-day hurdle but it might not be the sticking point. Penn State men’s basketball has always fought for the little things, be it the various improvements around the Bryce Jordan Center, the access to private flights or additional financial support from fans. Generally speaking those things have improved – in no small part due to Chambers’ efforts – but are in a constant state of evaluation.

Of course Kraft must please many different masters. Penn State has never been a basketball-first school, and as it looks to stay competitive on the football front, every dollar spent on Micah Shrewsberry’s needs is a dollar not spent on Jame Franklin’s. The classical thinking has been that this is the best way for Penn State to do business, and while there might be some truth to that it’s hard to imagine in a world of billion dollar media rights deals and 100 million dollar revenue streams that coughing up an extra million or two and throwing it at men’s basketball from time to time would subvert its goals with football.

Nevertheless, beyond the physical infrastructure is where it could get complicated, Penn State’s approach to Name Image and Likeness is an area where Shrewsberry has raised some concerns. While that’s not unique to basketball, nor particularly unique to Penn State, more substantial recruiting battles are harder to win for a program that has never had the financial backing in a traditional landscape, let alone in an NIL world. That’s something Kraft might not be able to remedy overnight, but it won’t make Shrewsberry’s program-building job any easier.

“We got guys. But we also lost guys,” Shrewsberry told On3 around the same time Kraft would go on to boast progress in that area. “We’re not gonna be like Illinois. Illinois is one of the best in the league right now with what they’re doing with NIL. But we have to do something. That’s something where we can’t fall behind. It’s about what you want as a program and what you’re happy with. If we have a little bit more that we’re offering to our guys, or that we’re doing for our team in NIL, that top 30 class is probably top 15 in the country. Just one or two more guys.”

“I can’t speak for everybody, but I would say of 14 teams in the Big Ten, we’re probably 14. Maybe 13,” Shrewsberry said. “So it’s just about who we want to be as a program. What are we willing to say is going to be our standard?”

That’s where the challenge might be for Kraft in the future, be it Notre Dame or someone else down the road. Shrewsberry will have to do more to get the big boys to come calling, but there are plenty of programs looking for up-and-coming coaches who have cut their teeth in the Big Ten. Shrewsberry’s squad hasn’t changed the dynamics of the conference, but it’s hard to watch the work he has done the last two years and not come away impressed.

And if the layman is impressed, so too might be more than a few athletic directors looking for a new head coach. If Kraft can stop that from happening is a different question all together, but if it comes down to putting his money where his mouth is, it will be interesting to see if he does.

“I’ve been at programs that haven’t had the most,” Shrewsberry told StateCollege.com prior to the season. “Like at Butler we weren’t Kansas, we weren’t Kentucky but we did the most with what we had. And I think that’s what we’ll try and do here. Like I don’t know if I’m gonna ask for a lot. It’s just not that important to me. If there’s things that are really important that we need to change, I’m gonna go ask for it. But I’m not gonna ask for something just to have it, right? Like, it’s got to be really important to our program. Really important to our student athletes.”