Zach Berger

Jermaine Marshall, the Nittany Lions basketball guard who averaged 15.3 points a game in a breakout junior season, has decided not to play professional basketball overseas and will instead transfer from Penn State. ESPN is reporting that Marshall has been granted his release and will be playing his final season outside of Happy Valley.

For the second time in as many weeks, Pat Chambers was able to get a verbal commit from a Philadelphia native. Shep Garner, a three-star guard recruit out of Philly's Roman Catholic High School will round out the 2014 recruiting class.

Pat Chambers has received his first commitment for the 2015 recruiting class in forward Mike Watkins from Philadelphia. Watkins played high school ball at Bartram High School and is also a member of the Team Philly 16U team this spring.

Adding on to an already impressive 2014 recruiting class, the Penn State football team can now add Michael O'Connor to the list. O'Connor, a four-star recruit and the eighth-ranked pro-style quarterback recruit in the nation, was expected to choose Happy Valley as his destination after considering a slew of schools including Michigan State, Vanderbilt, Missouri, South Florida, Southern Mississippi, Rutgers, Toledo, Mississippi State, Buffalo, and Akron.

Robin Petrini, the long-time head coach of the Penn State softball program, announced that she is resigning on Friday. A national search for her replacement will began immediately, according to athletic director Dave Joyner.

Petitions by Gary Schultz and Tim Curley to have charges against them related to the Sandusky scandal thrown out were denied on Friday by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, according to a report from CNN. Curley, formerly the Penn State athletic director, and Schultz, the former university vice president, argued that they were misrepresented by Cynthia Baldwin, the university's former chief legal officer, during the grand jury investigation last year.

Former Miami of Ohio guard Allen Roberts has made the decision to transfer to Penn State and play basketball for the Nittany Lions, according to Alex Kline of Rivals.com. Roberts helps to fill a void that was formed when Jermaine Marshall, the team's leading scorer last season, made the decision to forego his senior year and enter the draft.

Matt McGloin, recently signed by the Oakland Raiders after going undrafted following his strong senior campaign, is reportedly making a push up the depth chart. Chris Mortensen, ESPN's NFL insider, said on NFL 32 that McGloin was making a strong impression on the organization's higher-ups and pressuring his competition for the backup quarterback spot in Oakland.

The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA), a self-described "independent, non-profit organization commited to academic freedom, excellence, and accountability at America's colleges" based out of Washington, D.C., has released a statement supporting the recently filed Paterno family lawsuit againt the NCAA.

With excitement ramping up for this summer's Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts -- known widely as ArtsFest -- as it approaches in just six short weeks, this year's collectable poster was released and is available for free at a number of locations in State College.

Coquese Washington, head coach of the Penn State Lady Lions, was voted in as the president-elect of the Women's Basketball Coaches Association on Thursday. Washington will be the WBCA's vice president for the two coming academic years under Florida State's Seu Semrau before succeeding her for the two years after that, beginning with 2015-16.

Rusted Root -- yes, the band that plays "Send Me On My Way" -- will be playing at the Tussey Mountain Ampitheatre on Saturday, June 1. The group has a brand new album called the The Movement set to be released on October 30th, and they'll be playing old hits such as "Martyr" and "Ecstasy" along with their new stuff just two short weekends from now.

The second-ranked recruit in the nation and the top defensive back recruit will make his decision official on May 26th live on ESPNU, according to ESPN. Jabrill Peppers was sought by just about every college football program in the nation, but he's down to a short list of just six schools and Penn State is on it along with favorite Michigan, Stanford, Rutgers, Notre Dame, and LSU.

An Irish college football team, the University College Dublin Emerald Isle, are facing criticism for deciding to wear Penn State football jerseys in a game last night against American opponent Ohio Northern University, according to the Patriot News. The Irish team did not have enough jerseys to clothe their roster for the game, and it seems that Penn State was nice enough to lend them attire for the game.

The reunion was made official yesterday when Hodges and Mauti both inked four-year rookie deals with the Vikings. Hodges is expected to make around $2.5 million over the course of the four years, similar to the contract that the player drafted in the same spot received last year. The terms of both contracts are currently unknown. Hodges was the first Viking draft pick to sign this offseason.

Jay Paterno seems to always say the right things at the right times. Throughout the entirety of the events that have unfolded since the scandal first became news at Penn State, he has been nothing but professional, well-spoken, and timely with any and all comments that he has offered. Nothing has changed, as was evident in an article released yesterday by CBS Sports detailing an interview with Jay Paterno on a number of topics...

Bill O'Brien has been keeping busy on the second Coaches Caravan, a dinner and meet-and-greet tour on which O'Brien and other Penn State athletic coaches get a chance to interact with fans and alumni. There was a video released by Fight On State following a recent stop on Penn State's DuBois campus of O'Brien's speech, the second-to-last destination on this spring's Coaches Caravan.

A new report by Louis Freeh, commissioned by Steve Wynn of Wynn Resorts, is facing similar scrutiny to his Penn State report after a response was released by former Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.

A few weeks of rumors were officially confirmed today, and the news will result in changes to the Big Ten football divisions and schedule. Penn State will be playing in the Big Ten East along with Ohio State, Michigan, Michigan State, Indiana, Rutgers, and Maryland.

Nike co-founder Phil Knight -- who had a close relationship with Joe Paterno as a result of Nike's coach retreats -- has reversed course today on his opinion following yesterday's release of a Paterno family critique of the Freeh Report, admitting that he had not read the report in full before releasing a statement condemning Paterno this past summer.

Real, homemade gameday food isn't as hard as you might think. You can make it yourself. It will be delicious. Your friends will be extremely impressed. You'll have a full stomach. Your Super Bowl party will be the best between University and Atherton. But how? That's where me and my esteemed colleague Catie Simpson come in.

While the rival Pittsburgh Penguins and the Philadelphia Flyers do open their lockout-shortened seasons this afternoon in Philly, make sure to stay on your couch and tune in to Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia at 8 p.m. for the first annual Philadelphia College Hockey Faceoff between the Penn State Nittany Lions and the University of Vermont Catamounts, taking place in the Wells Fargo Center following the Pens-Flyers game.

Just two weeks ago, Penn State was trailing Kentucky and rival Nebraska in a vote for the EA Sports NCAA Football 14 cover. Instead of enshrining just one player on the cover as they have in past years, EA will be putting an entire university's football team on the 2014 cover. 32 teams have endured the first round of voting to move on, and EA is again asking for fans of each remaining school to participate in a vote, asking, "Which school do you want to be on the cover of the next NCAA Football?"

The cover photo for the legendary EA Sports video game series NCAA Football is always a popular topic. Previous covers include Robert Griffin III, Tim Tebow, Reggie Bush, and even Mark Sanchez (lol). But this year, EA Sports is doing things a little differently. Rather than feature an individual player, the video game empire will feature an entire team on the cover based on a fan vote -- and all 126 BCS schools have a chance.

One of the unsung heroes of any organization is the vice president, often overshadowed by his or her running mate upon election to office. Penn State's student government is no different, with the vice president routinely taking on the brunt of the executive work as delegated by the president. The current stalwart holding that position is UPUA Vice President Katelyn Mullen. I got a chance to catch up with Katelyn and discuss her role in student government, her cameo on an MTV reality show, and all things veep-related.

Last night's University Park Undergraduate Association general assembly meeting was certainly eventful. There was Christmas music blasting before the meeting began. There were assembly members in red and green, including Diversity Committee Chair Dutch Markward, who wore Christmas-themed suspenders. There was legislation to give a ton of your student activity fee money to Movin' On because they can't afford the acts that they want. There was even a new Academic Affairs Committee Chair elected. Now that I have you hooked, read on.

The Diversity Awareness Task Force was formed, holding its first meeting last night, with about 30 students in attendance. The meeting was mostly organizational as the task force wanted to establish the essentials of the diversity issue at Penn State, the best ways to tackle those problems, and what committee breakdowns would be best fitted to handle them.

In response to rising tension about racism at Penn State sparked by the Chi Omega photo that has become national news, the University Park Undergraduate Association will form a focus group to discuss race issues on campus.

To gauge what Penn State students think about race and cultural issues, UPUA has released a diversity survey. Read more about it after the jump.

A group of approximately 75 students of all different ethnic and cultural backgrounds filed into last night's UPUA meeting to speak about the Chi Omega racially insensitive photo, which has become national news over the past two days.