Penn State 2012 Spring Practice Schedule: Preview, Questions and Position Battle

The 2011 college football season may have just ended, but that doesn't mean that the players and coaches go sit on the couch for seven months. No, first it was the recruiting process, and now it's time to begin preparing for spring practices.

These practices are extremely important, as they will help the coaches answer questions and help them put together their depth chart for the upcoming season. This is also a chance for the younger players to prove themselves and earn more playing time than they probably would have otherwise received.

Here are a few position battles and questions to pay attention to heading into spring practice and the spring game for Penn State.

Can Anybody Throw the Football?

Watching the Nittany Lions throw the football last season could really drive a sane man crazy. Their passing game finished ranked 96th in the country, as Penn State relied heavily on their running game and defense to finish the year with a 9-4 record.

The good news is that head coach Bill O'Brien has done wonders working with quarterbacks, but this may be his tallest task yet. Both Matthew McGloin and Rob Bolden have seen significant playing time the last couple of years, but neither has made much progress. There is a young quarterback in Paul Jones on the roster, but he has yet to even throw the football.

This is by far the biggest question heading into the season for the Nittany Lions.

Defense

We're going to keep things short and sweet in this slide and say that the entire defense has many question marks heading into the spring. First, you have a new offensive coordinator in Ted Roof, who did do great things at Duke, but wasn't so hot with Auburn.

He'll have the job of trying to replace a fantastic defensive tackle in Devon Still, who ended up winning the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year. The secondary also loses key players in safety Nick Sukay and Drew Astorino, who were veteran players.

The truth is, Penn State leaned on this defense a lot last year to bail them out, and now it only returns five starters. There will be a lot of questions that need to be answered, and, at this point, nearly every position on this unit is up for grabs.

Freshmen That Could Start

Penn State is only returning a total of 10 starters from a year ago. That leaves several holes to fill with a recruiting class that wasn't exactly loaded with elite recruits.

One of the players that could see immediate playing time is wide receiver Eugene Lewis, who has great size at 6'2", 180 pounds and is great at picking up yards after the catch.

Another area of concern is on the offensive line as that part of the offense is going to look completely different. Players like Wendy Laurent and Anthony Stanko and Austin Johnson could see time as well their freshman year.

With so many players that have left this season, there are a lot of young players that you may see a lot of this season.

Other players to keep an eye on include: running back Akeel Lynch, defensive tackle Brian Gaia, tight end Brent Wilkerson and linebacker Nyeem Wartman.

Distractions?

While most schools will be able to focus on just the football side of things leading up to the regular season, Penn State will have to handle things a little bit differently.

Not only do they have a new head coach in Bill O'Brien who's never been a head coach and is replacing a legend in Joe Paterno, but they also have a sex scandal that's still hanging over the university and will continue to draw questions throughout the year.

These are things that can either make or break a team, and it's even more interesting with a new head coach having to deal with it all.

This may take a while to see exactly how it affects this team, but it is something to keep an eye on.

Randy Chambers is a B/R featured columnist that covers college football and the NFL. You can contact him @Randy_Chambers or [e-mail].