Penn State 2025 position battle preview: Defense looking for key starters, development backups

Now that we have a gauge of the 2025 Penn State football roster, we can begin to plant the seeds of expectation for the 2025 season. The competition for playing time starts when the team reconvenes for winter workouts in the next month, and before you know it, we'll be into spring camp battles. Before we get to all of that, let's identify where the battles will take place based on the roster, vacated spots in the rotation, and a reasonable expectation of player progressions for the upcoming season. Today, we'll start with the defense.