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In our "Out of Spring" series, Orange and Blue News takes a look at spring football for the Illini's 2018 opponents.

We close out the serious with the Penn State Nittany Lions. Illinois hosts Penn State at Memorial Stadium in Champaign on September 21, 2018.

Penn State is coming off an 11-2 seasons in 2017, including a win over Washington in the Playstation Fiesta Bowl. Running back Saquon Barkley finished fourth in the Heisman Trophy voting after ranking No. 2 in the nation in all-purpose yards. James Franklin has posted a 36-17 record in four seasons in Happy Valley.

Illinois and Penn State last met in the 2015 season. The Nittany Lions beat Illinois 39-0 behind 266 yards passing from Christian Hackenberg. Barkely, then a true freshman, rushed for 84 yards and a TD.

The Nittany Lions held their annual Blue-White game on April 21 in front of an estimated 71,000 fans at Beaver Stadium. Wide receiver Mac Hippenhammer finished with four catches, good for 43 yards and two touchdowns. Defensive back Zech McPhearson was a stand-out with three pass break ups.

Orange and Blue News caught up with Nate Bauer from Blue-White Illustrated to get the lowdown on Penn State following spring football. Follow Nate Bauer on Twitter @NateBauerBWI. Follow Penn State football @PennStateFball.

How do the Nittany Lions replace All-World running back Saquon Barkley? He was such a big part of the offense. Who are some potential play-makers who could fill the void?

Nate Bauer: Before Barkley, the same question was asked of wideout Chris Godwin, who’d had an outsized role in Penn State’s offense during the 2016 season. And the answer is about as you’d expect when a first or second-round NFL draft guy wraps his collegiate career, which is to say simply that no individual is going to replace the production Barkley brought to the field. He was a do-it-all back, routinely breaking off highlight-reel runs and, maybe more important, hauling in 54 receptions last season - good for second on the team.

So where does that leave Penn State’s running backs room?

Though certainly less experienced, Miles Sanders was Rivals’ No. 1 running back in the country for the Class of 2016. Expectations are high that his two years working under Barkley’s wing will have rubbed off enough to make Sanders ready for his run as a feature back. He won’t be alone in that pursuit, either. Senior Mark Allen has been a reliable piece in the room for years, fellow senior Johnathan Thomas earned positive reviews through the spring, redshirt freshman Journey Brown is a former Pennsylvania high school champion in the 100m, and incoming freshman Ricky Slade was the nation’s No. 2-ranked back in the Class of 2018.

In some ways, the more concerning losses to Penn State are those of wideout DaeSean Hamilton and tight end Mike Gesicki. By the second half of the 2017 season, most teams had decided Barkley wasn’t going to be the guy that beat them. In most cases, that meant that Hamilton and Gesicki were two targets that routinely would. Tight end does not have an obvious answer for Gesicki’s absence, and in terms of reliability, Penn State will look to Juwan Johnson to flourish as a feature receiver with veterans DeAndre Thompkins and Brandon Polk as complements, plus highly anticipated redshirt freshmen K.J. Hamler and Mac Hippenhammer, as well as incoming five-star true freshman Justin Shorter all having opportunities to make an immediate impact this season.

The Penn State staff had significant turnover in the offseason, including offensive coordinator Joe Moorehead, who became the head coach at Mississippi State. Who are some of the new coaches who are on board, what do they bring to the staff, and how will the changes impact the schemes?

NB: Arguably the most important component to Moorhead’s departure was James Franklin’s hiring of Ricky Rahne to serve as the replacement. Rahne began his Penn State stint as the quarterbacks' coach, then moved to take over tight ends while Moorhead moved into the role the past two seasons, and now is back in charge of both quarterbacks and as the offensive coordinator. Penn State is counting on that continuity to pay off, both in terms of Rahne’s acclimation to Moorhead’s system as well as in Rahne’s comfortability with quarterback Trace McSorley and the rest of the room. A bowl game is hardly a body of work to judge from, but Rahne’s debut as full-time offensive coordinator produced 545 yards, 25 first downs and 35 points in Penn State’s 35-28 win over Washington in the Fiesta Bowl.

Having coaching veteran Phil Galiano already in place and with the program made Charles Huff’s departure with Moorhead a relatively seamless transition for the special teams' coordinator. Former Penn State graduate assistant Tyler Bowen, following a few years at both Fordham and Maryland, returned to take over for Rahne in handling the tight ends. David Corley, originally hired from Army to take over the running backs room, switched his duties quickly with the departure of Josh Gattis to Alabama over to wide receivers. And finally, Ja’Juan Seider, an assistant at both West Virginia and Florida, was brought on to handle the running backs. A mix of experience and youth, Franklin’s palpable disappointment at having lost a few of his assistants for what might be considered lateral moves have been tempered by his satisfaction at the replacements secured in their absences.

What were some of the biggest storylines going into spring football, and what questions do you think were answered?

NB: The biggest storylines for the spring are the biggest storylines for preseason camp are the biggest storylines for the 2018 season. Which is to say, Penn State needs a Mike linebacker, it needs some depth at defensive tackle, and it needs some tight ends.

Certainly, I think Penn State made it clear that it was very, very happy with what it was seeing from its offensive line. This has been a slow burn to this point, but the Lions’ OL had to have been among the worst in the Power Five conferences when Franklin took the job. It was just absolutely decimated by a sanction-related recruiting falloff, and the process of getting that unit back up to speed is something that couldn’t be fixed overnight. Now, the years of solid recruiting are represented by redshirt sophomores and juniors that have experience, with youthful, talented depth pushing from behind to take their reps. I don’t know if Franklin would describe it as ideal, but it’s no doubt the best line and is expected to be an actual asset, that they’ve had in the past five years.

Who were some break-out performers and newcomers this spring that fans should be aware of? Talk about 5-star freshman linebacker Micah Parsons in particular. How did he look this spring?

NB: I think certainly Hamler was the talk of the spring from a “breakout” perspective, and given the need at wide receiver, it stands to reason that his performance came at a time when Penn State was really counting on seeing a spark there.

Micah Parsons has definitely been one of the major talking points through the spring, but I think that they’re in a spot where they’re just trying to decide how to best use him. And, I’ll use defensive end Yetur Gross-Matos as a reference point from the 2017 season to help explain the situation. Basically, Gross-Matos presented himself instantly as a guy that had separated himself from the pack. He could play, and he could play right away, at a position that Penn State typically doesn’t see a guy come out of high school that is ready to produce. What made his situation work, however, was the fact that there were some veteran pieces in front of him that could allow Gross-Matos to really dial in on being an obvious passing down pass-rusher. Let him unleash that raw talent while not overwhelming him by simply limiting his role.

I think, essentially, that’s where they are with Parsons. It takes years to be the dependable guy at Mike linebacker, one who - if a mistake is made, it’s made convincingly with the rest of the defense following suit to make up for it. Parsons isn’t there, and they know it, so in spite of a few weeks’ reps at Mike linebacker, he ended up moving around a bit by the end of the spring. He made eight tackles in the Blue-White Game, though, so it’s a little bit of a look into what Penn State’s coaching staff is dealing with right now. He has to get on the field, but it’s essential that they frame out the proper role for him so that he can have some success, build up his confidence further and let him acclimate fully to a position that he’s never played before, having come out of high school as an elite defensive end.

What are some questions that still need to be answered when Penn State opens camp later this summer?

NB: In my mind, tight end is the critical unknown right now, and I’m not sure if there will be an answer for it even by the time preseason camp closes. Penn State doesn’t disclose the nature of injuries, or even injuries themselves, but last season’s No. 2 receptions leader at tight end, Jonathan Holland (3 catches for 16 yards) missed the entire spring, and the third-leading tight end, Nick Bowers (1 catch for a 15-yard touchdown), also suffered the same fate. Now, that left plenty of available reps for Danny Dalton, who’s had an injury-plagued career himself, as well as early enrollee Zack Kuntz. But by the spring game, even Kuntz was absent, leaving a situation in the Blue-White Game where the Lions’ offense was running two-back sets as “necessity” because “they didn’t want us to be out there with only 10 guys on the field,” according to Rahne, who was referencing the bludgeoning to the tight end depth chart.

Considering the success that Penn State’s offense has had the past two seasons, driven with crucial help from Gesicki’s combined 102 receptions for 1,242 yards and 14 touchdowns, it’s imperative that at least one healthy, reliable option presents itself in the offense. Even without Moorhead and some of the integral pieces to that run, Penn State isn’t looking to rock the boat and completely redefine itself. Rather, after a Big Ten Championship, a Rose Bowl berth and a Fiesta Bowl win, it’s trying to further those explosive elements into a sustainable identity. A tight end is absolutely a big piece of that puzzle, and coming off a lost spring of missed reps, it’s one Penn State will be searching for answers to throughout the summer and into preseason camp.