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P enn State football fans who are also followers of Pennsylvania high school football had good reason to question the quality and depth of talent that existed in the Keystone State a>er only one player in the Class of 2020 – Julian Fleming of Southern Columbia High in Catawissa – ended up being ranked among the nation's top 250 prospects by Rivals.com. The striking absence of Pennsylvania players on the Rivals250 raised anew a question that Penn State fans have been dwelling on for the past few years: Is the state's talent base dwindling to the point where Penn State will have to perma- nently change its approach to recruiting, de-emphasizing Pennsylvania and fo- cusing on other, more-distant high school football hotbeds? The Nittany Lions want to be able to compete for the Big Ten championship on an annual basis, so if they can't ;nd the players they need within a 350-mile radius of campus, what choice do they have but to look elsewhere? The perception that Pennsylvania isn't producing elite players they way it did in the 1970s, '80s and '90s is rooted in de- mographic changes that have taken place over the past 25 years. Those changes have manifested themselves in very obvious ways. The Big 33 Game, for example, used to be one of the great high school all-star games in the country, pitting the top players in Pennsylvania against their counterparts from states like Ohio and Texas. Now, however, it's di=cult for the game's administrators and coaches to ;ll a roster with blue- chip players. Something else to consider is the com- position of Penn State's recent recruit- ing classes. It's become apparent to those who follow recruiting with a pas- sion that the Nittany Lions might end up signing no more than four or ;ve Penn- sylvania players in any given year. In 2017, they signed only ;ve in-state re- cruits: running back Journey Brown, de- fensive lineman Damion Barber, safety Lamont Wade and o

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