Micah Shrewsberry shares how Camren Wynter has grown in confidence

Camren Wynter was the hero once again Sunday for Micah Shrewsberry and the entire Penn State faithful. Wynter hit a game-winning layup off an offensive rebound with just 0.5 seconds remaining to win it for the Nittany Lions over Maryland.

The basket closed off a 30-14 run for Penn State at the end of the game to complete a massive comeback.

The game-winner is the latest example of Wynter playing winning basketball over the last few weeks as the calendar turned to March. Shrewsberry said in his postgame press conference that Wynter has been really good recently getting to where he wants to go.

“He’s really aggressive trying to get his spots,” Shrewsberry said. “We talk a lot about our shot profile as a team. We want to get to the rim. We want to get layups. We want to shoot open threes. We don’t want to shoot a boat load of mid-range, tough pull-up twos. But he’s thrived on that throughout his whole career. I tried to talk to him about be yourself and I’ll coach the other guys. The fear is Cam starts shooting some pull-ups then somebody else thinks it’s okay so now they take two. Then somebody else thinks it’s okay and they take two. Then somebody else takes another one and now that’s all we’re getting. I was like you be yourself. Just be yourself. I’ll continue to coach everybody else.”

Wynter is averaging 8.7 points per game on the season. But after the last five games of the regular season, the fifth-year guard is averaging 15.6 points per game.

While he only had six points on 3-for-5 shooting against the Terrapins, Wynter was able to contribute in a variety of ways.

“I think he’s just playing with no pressure,” Shrewsberry said. “He’s just playing free. He’s just been loose. He’s been in attack mode. He’s scored when he needed to. Even when he was struggling, he’s continued to work on his game. So now he’s very confident in his shot, shooting open threes. He’s been as big of a factor [for] us playing this well late in the year as anybody.”

Micah Shrewsberry explains Penn State’s end-of-game success after Camren Wynter game-winner

Camren Wynter’s lead-second game-winning basket was not his first of the season for Micah Shrewsberry’s Penn State team. In fact, it wasn’t even the first one of the week.

Wynter hit a game-winning 3-pointer in overtime Wednesday to defeat Northwestern.

The two games are emblematic of a Nittany Lions group that has developed a strong clutch gene.

“Just playing together a little bit more, longer in the season,” Shrewsberry said. “We’re adjusting to how people are guarding us. Now late in the game, they can do things on the fly. They can talk to each other on the fly late in the game. … When we can just go to a simple action that we’ve been running the whole second half, now it’s just communication. … It’s all simple. It’s all communication. It’s all fast, and we can just play, without allowing other people to set things up. So they know what they’re looking for, they know what they’re trying to get to. I think that’s helped us late game, of really executing.”