Marques Hagans is focused on the here and now. He’s put the past behind him. The Orange Bowl, in which the wide receiver group he oversees failed to register a single reception. The past two seasons of underperformance and underutilization. All of it. Hagans has adopted a new perspective in his third season as Penn State’s wide receivers coach: It’s time for change.
Harrison Wallace III and Omari Evans, the team’s top two wide receivers from a season ago, are gone. In their place are two transfers, Devonte Ross and Kyron Hudson. The spring will give Hagans and the rest of the Nittany Lions’ coaching staff a better idea of the talent at their disposal, but returning to the portal for a new receiver now appears to be an inevitable concept.
Penn State athletic director Pat Kraft broke the ice first. He didn’t mince words while addressing the local media in February. Kraft was asked about addressing needs in the transfer portal. He spoke about the wide receiver position: “We all know we need wide receiver help, so we gotta go find one.”
Hagans, who was asked about Kraft’s comments after practice on Tuesday, agrees.
“We could always use help. I think the objective is to be the best in the country at every position, and we’re working to become that. And until we become that, then, yes, we do need help at receiver,” Hagans said. “So, we just got to keep building the room the right way, bringing in the right guys, and then when the opportunity presents, we just got to perform at a high level.”
There remains just three Nittany Lions who recorded catches as part of last year’s team. Liam Clifford tallied 18 receptions across 16 games. Tyseer Denmark caught two passes, one being a garbage time score that elicited a sour postgame greeting between James Franklin and Maryland coach Mike Locksley. And then there’s Anthony Ivey, who hauled in one reception.
The need for more depth and talent has been made abundantly clear to Hagans and Kraft, and should resonate with pretty much anyone who watched Penn State last season. But it hasn’t struck a chord with the wide receivers on roster, like Clifford, a veteran presence whose workload is at stake if another receiver is added when the portal reopens on April 16.
“I mean, ultimately, that’s up to them. I don’t necessarily think it’s needed. I think we have everything we need in the room currently,” Clifford said. “But ultimately, that’s up to them. But bringing guys in, as long as they’re pushing the room, making us to be our best, and that’s all I care about.”
And that’s just the way Hagans would like it this spring. He’s been transparent, open with his group that if they don’t compete up to the standard of a team with national title aspirations, then that could mean their jobs. And Hagans, who has done little to silence the noise of critics since joining the Nittany Lions prior to the 2023 season, is, more or less, in the same boat.
“I love the guys that we have, but the ultimate thing is to always, constantly get better any way. So, that’s nothing that the guys in the room would shy away from or feel a certain way about hearing. Like, that’s recruiting,” Hagans said. “My job is to bring in the best guys in the country and then replace the guys that are here, and their job is to make sure it doesn’t happen.”
That’s the attitude Hagans is hoping to instill in his unit this offseason, with the intent that the mentality will translate to success and ultimately last. And in the modern era of college football, when teams have multiple opportunities to address team needs and improve their weak links, this is possible. Hagans is looking for wide receivers who can excel in this environment.
“We gotta find guys who love football, and guys who are tough. Excuse my language, just tough as shit, like, every day,” Hagans said. “Like, if we played football in the parking lot and you rolled the football out and we were gonna tackle, they wouldn’t give a shit. They just line up and play.
“We need guys like that, and then guys smart enough to be able to take the things that we’re doing schematically and apply them in the field and the competitive setting against the best teams in the country. And when that happens, those are the right guys.”
