Penn State strengthens its defensive line with a transfer of the former Duke defense suit Derrick Tangelo. The senior, who played his high school ball at The Bullis School in Gaithersburg, Md., Announced the decision Tuesday afternoon.
The 6-foot 2 and 310-pound prospect was one of the ACC’s most consistent domestic defenders last season for the Blue Devils. He ended the year with 40 tackles, four tackles for loss and two sacks. He also forced three fobbles and restored one.
For his career at Duke, Tangelo played in 45 games and recorded 114 tackles, 12 tackles for loss, 4.5 sacks and five foubles.
Potential sixth-year defensive attack Antonio Shelton announced last week that he would complete his election elsewhere. Shelton has played in all nine games this year, scoring a career-best 4.5 tackles for loss and 3.5 sacks. Tangelo is a contender to fill his starting spot with veteran PJ Mustipher. Red panties first year Hakeem Beamon and red shirt junior Fred Hansard were the best reserves of the Nittany Lions within this season. Redshirt second year Judge Culpepper also entered the Portal last week. The Nittany Lions also have a bunch of younger players who can pursue their scholarship.
Penn State has sought to strengthen its depth and competitive levels at all positions via the Transfer Portal during the off-season. Tangelo is the third addition by the Portal and joins the former Baylor career John Lovett and former South Carolina diagonal John Dixon.
“The big change we think is likely to happen here soon is that children will be eligible immediately,” said Nittany Lions’ staff director. Andy Frank said on the national signing day. ‘It’s going to be another boom in what the transfer portal means. I think we all realize that the transfers for us at Penn State were not a big part of our overall recruitment process. That will change. We are not going to make money full time in terms of all our players will come to the transfer portal in any way. We’re still going to do most of our recruitment from the high school ranks, but we’re going to be active in the transfer portal and we’ll be looking for guys who can help us fill in the gaps. ‘