Ed Wilson coaches basketball for eight, nine and 10-year-old kids in the Severna Park area of Maryland. Through various ties he has in the community, he has coached some pretty decent ball players in the past 24 years.

But Wilson remembers one especially talented 7-year-old who stood out head and shoulders above all the older kids. He could dribble, he could drive, he could use his left hand, he could score -- he could do it all at the tender age of seven. And even after all of the really good kids Wilson coached, this kid is still one of the top five Wilson has ever seen.

That local talent is in college now, and will start at shooting guard for Penn State tonight when the Lions take on Iowa at 8 p.m. in Rec Hall. Now in his final tour of duty as a Nittany Lion, Michael Jennings has come a long way from those days under Wilson.

The 6-foot-4 guard only has six games left to leave his indelible footprints in the Penn State basketball sands. But if you ask him, he'll tell you he's already left his impression on the Rec Hall faithful.

"Oh, they'll remember me," said the senior, adding that he's given a new dimension to guard play at Penn State -- something that his predecessors Monroe Brown and Freddie Barnes didn't do.

"I know Monnie and Freddie played hard," he said, a sly grin breaking across his face. "But they never dunked."

It's ironic that Jennings mentions those two when talking about what he's brought to the program. To hear him tell it, those two were the ones who tutored him on basketball.

He learned discipline -- when to go to the hoop, when not to, what to do and when to do it, what he didn't have coming out of high school -- all of those things were passed down to Jennings by the two elders.

"They kind of schooled me," Jennings said. "They were like the Jedis, I was the young Luke Skywalker."

He's come a long way. Tonight begins the six-game sojourn into basketball fan's memories.

His may not be the most storied career in Penn State history, but it's definitely one of the most colorful -- mostly because of Jennings himself. Anyone who's ever known him will tell you he's got an awful lot of personality.

He's been blessed with it. Ask his mom, Isabell Watts.

"He's always been a fun-loving child," she said. "People would say he's a wonderful person, very respectful, well-mannered -- and that made me feel good."

Jennings' outgoing demeanor is what former coach Wilson recalls about him also. Moreso than the basketball ability of this young phenom, the 71-year-old Wilson remembers Jennings the person, a kid who showed a lot of maturity for his age, and just happened to be a pretty darned good basketball player.

But ask anybody who's ever come in contact with him -- they'll probably tell you the same thing.

"He befriends a lot of people," Brown said. "His personality -- he can become cool with just about anybody."

Even Jennings' 16-year-old sister Monique realizes that everybody will remember her brother long after he's gone. A pretty good ball player herself, the 10th-grader has already received several letters from top women's programs. Would she consider coming to Happy Valley to play for the perennially high-ranked Lady Lions?

"I want to go somewhere where I can be known as Monique," she said, "not Michael Jennings' little sister."

Yeah, they'll definitely remember Michael Jennings.