With family in the crowd and the knowledge that a severely sprained left wrist -- injured a few days earlier at Ohio State -- would probably end his Penn State basketball career, Ben Luber had two requests of the coaching staff for Saturday's Senior Day game against Illinois. A spot in the starting lineup and a chance to leave the floor under his own terms.

So seconds after the opening tip, the fourth-year point guard controlled the ball with his healthy right hand and the substitution horn sounded.

Luber slowly walked off the Bryce Jordan Center court for the final time during a game and Mike Walker, Luber's close friend and teammate, replaced him. To most everyone else in the arena, the scene was purely ceremonial. For Luber, it was five therapeutic and precious seconds.

"I wanted to go and just be out there. I didn't know that Ohio State was going to end my career," Luber said. "I wanted to be out on the court one last time."

***

The dedicated fans in attendance Saturday gave Luber a respectable ovation, but he will be the first one to admit that spectators haven't always been so friendly.

From hecklers at the Jordan Center, word-of-mouth from friends or the occasional ugly look from a passer-by while walking around campus, Luber knows some fans of the men's basketball team have blamed him for many of the Nittany Lions' defeats the past four seasons.

As the person responsible for handling the basketball every time down the floor, Luber understands why he's had some critics though he doesn't necessarily agree with their reasoning, or find the arguments credible.

"Sometimes I do take blame when I feel I am to blame, but every loss isn't because of me," Luber said earlier this month. "I'm not going to put that much weight on my shoulders."

He knows that turning the ball over several times in a game usually, and justly, elicits boos. But the former Council Rock North High School standout also believes he has been too easy of a target for criticism for much of his career.

Luber likens his situation to Penn State quarterback Anthony Morelli's. In football, the quarterback touches the ball every offensive possession. Everyone notices if he throws an interception. Not many immediately recognize a missed block by a lineman.

In basketball, the point guard is the ball-handler -- the quarterback -- and just as in football, there is no hiding mistakes. However, if the teammate he passes the ball to misses a wide-open shot, few quickly realize that although the point guard didn't register an assist, he did his job.

"If we win a game, normally the fans won't say anything because they expect to win. They won't give you credit," Luber said. "But you lose a game, and the focus is magnified onto the guy who does the majority of handling the basketball, or football in that case, and you get a lot of criticism."

Fans also want to see points, Luber said, but scoring isn't something the Penn State coaching staff has asked him to do. Bring the ball up court and pass to someone else has basically been his orders. That's what he and those closest to him feel he's done in 107 career games, 97 of which he was in the starting lineup.

The player who left Council Rock North as the school's all-time leading scorer won't leave Penn State at the top of any scoring charts with his 6.5 points per game average. But he will be the third player in school history to lead in assists for four seasons, ranking seventh all-time, and be top 10 in steals.

"I don't think I've ever been told to be real scorer as far as plays go, but I try to do what they tell me what to do, setting the play up, intensity on defense," Luber said. "It'd be nice be more of a threat offensively scoring wise, but that hasn't really happened for me."

These are the behind-the-scenes things Luber says fans don't really understand. Had Luber, at 6-feet and 175-pounds, been able to score like he did in high school, maybe mistakes like turnovers would have been overshadowed.

So when he's heard phrases like "Get him off the court!" and "Get him out of the game!" from the mouths of some at the Jordan Center, Luber has brushed off the criticism. Because hecklers don't know what he knows, and they definitely don't know him.

"They're not coaching or playing. They're there for entertainment, not because they know so much about basketball," Luber said.

"When people say those things, you can't think you're as bad as they say you are. If you think that, it turns over to the next game, and your confidence starts to go down. You end up believing what the fans are believing: 'Should I really be playing? Am I that bad? Is this my fault?' You don't take too much weight from their opinions."

***

There is a person within the men's basketball program that Luber especially listens to. Adam Fisher, a fellow Penn State senior, and one of the team's head managers knows Luber better than most and has seen him play more than any current coach or player.

Jerry Dunn, the coach who recruited Luber, resigned prior to the point guard's first season. Luber's fellow incoming freshman classmates, 7-foot center John Kelly and guard Marlon Smith became two of the several players who eventually fled Happy Valley after current head coach Ed DeChellis was hired.

So it's Fisher, who played basketball for Central Bucks East, a rival high school of Luber's, that is the only one currently connected to program who consistently saw the way Luber used to play in high school and how he's played in college.

Fisher, along with Walker and Danny Morrissey, both juniors, are Luber's most trusted friends. Before practice this Monday, Luber and Fisher played a game of P-I-G with a meal at the Waffle Shop on the line. Luber, with a cast on his left hand, shot one-handed jumpers with his right. He eventually lost to Fisher, who made sure to let Luber know he enjoys a side of bacon.

"I'm probably more critical on him than any of the people that read things or write about him," Fisher said. "If he plays well, I tell him. If he doesn't play well, I tell him. I also tell him they don't see everything that goes on -- keep your confidence, keep playing hard. We've had good talks about it."

Fisher can vividly see Luber as the primary scoring threat that broke defenders down, shot lights out and led Council Rock North to the second round of the PIAA AAAA playoffs his senior season.

As a result, Luber attracted interest from several nearby Philadelphia schools: Saint Joseph's, Temple, Penn, Drexel and Villanova, according to Luber's father, Ron, along with Penn State.

After visiting State College, seeing the Big Ten facilities, and listening to a suggestion from Villanova coach Jay Wright, Luber verbally committed to Penn State.

Wright, the brother of Luber's high school coach Derek Wright and knew Luber for several years, told him that Penn State would be the best place to go. Villanova already had a loaded back court led by Randy Foye, who is now with the NBA's Minnesota Timberwolves, and Wright respected Luber enough to give him an honest opinion: He would play more and, most likely, right away at Penn State.

Little did Luber know how many significant minutes he would play early on. Luber watched Dunn announce his resignation on television in March 2003 and soon heard the big-time names that floated around as possible replacements.

Tim Floyd, now coach at Southern California, and Steve Lavin, former UCLA coach and current ESPN analyst were two of those, but Penn State went a familiar face: DeChellis, a former assistant under Dunn and before that, Bruce Parkhill.

It was a recognizable name to some dedicated followers of the program but not to most current players.

"I had never heard of him," Luber said of DeChellis.

A parade of transfers began soon after the hiring. Before Luber played a game, Sharif Chambliss, Penn State's leading scorer the prior two seasons, quickly headed to Wisconsin. Brandon Cameron, a guard who was projected to share duties with Luber and Smith, also packed his bags.

Kelly kept his commitment, but went to Iona after appearing in just two games. Deforrest Riley-Smith, a regular starter at power forward, also transferred midseason to Southern where he is now completing his senior year.

Penn State was left with enough players to field a starting lineup and little else. DeChellis and other members of the coaching staff began serving as practice players, and Luber played nearly every possible minute during games.

"When everyone kept leaving and we were practicing with eight players, it was crazy," Luber said.

Luber averaged 38 minutes per game as a freshman and played every second of 13 games, including 45 minutes in an overtime win against Northwestern. He was the only true point guard on the team and set a school record for assists by a freshman with 114. He also had 93 turnovers. The Lions went 9-19 overall and 3-13 in the Big Ten. The overall experience was like, "being thrown right to the wolves," Luber said.

Then after that season, more teammates packed up and left. Jan Jagla, a 7-footer, headed overseas to play professionally and another big man, Robert Summers, made his way to West Virginia, where he is now one of the first Mountaineers off the bench.

Yet Luber's sophomore season figured to be slightly better. DeChellis added several new players -- Geary Claxton, Travis Parker, Brandon Hassell -- and more importantly, two guards in Morrissey and Walker.

Luber's minutes dropped to a manageable 29 per game, but Penn State went 7-23 overall and 1-15 in the conference. After that season, Aaron Johnson, the Big Ten's leading rebounder, and Smith, who averaged 12.6 points per game in his two seasons, made their exodus from Happy Valley. Luber was now the lone member of his freshman class at Penn State. Still, he didn't consider leaving.

"I didn't really put my name out there," Luber said, even though friends from his hometown of Richboro told him he had to get out. In his mind, there were more things that Penn State offered than basketball.

He was working toward the kinesiology degree he plans to use to open up a gym if an attempt at a basketball career in Europe doesn't work out. And sophomore year, Luber began going out with his current girlfriend, who transferred to Penn State after spending her freshman year at Temple. They attended high school together, but didn't start seeing each other until after both were in college.

So Luber entered his junior season as the lone player with connections to the Dunn era. He said he could have, "given up like some other people did," and sought a transfer, but stayed, and doing so is something he doesn't regret.

"There's been more losses than wins, but I still wouldn't trade it for the relationships I've made with the guys on the team," Luber said. "That's very important."

***

Luber's junior season was his best on-court, he said, primarily because the Lions reached the postseason NIT, going 15-15 overall and 6-10 in the conference.

But the 2005-06 season was also Luber's best statistically. He posted the third best assist-to-turnover ratio in the Big Ten, only behind Michigan State's Drew Neitzel and Ohio State's Jamar Butler.

His other three seasons, like the Penn State men's basketball team in general, haven't been as impressive. Luber ranked either 10th (freshman year) or eighth (sophomore) in the conference in the statistical category that defines point guard play. This season, he had 35 assists to 20 turnovers in Big Ten play, but doesn't have the 3.0 assist per game average to qualify for a ranking.

Those are the statistics that could, and perhaps were used as ammunition by a fan to create a message board thread with the subject line, "Who stole Ben?" when Luber played well during a game earlier this season.

"Maybe they just don't like me. I don't know," Luber said. "I don't know any of them."

Blaming one player isn't a means to and end, Luber said. He's merely done what the coaching staff has asked of him while trying to help Penn State to the postseason.

It was never realistic that he would be the type of player he was in high school, and he doesn't think he's brought the team to its current 13-game losing streak on his own.

"I haven't had the worst career of anybody to ever come to Penn State. The team wasn't doing great before I got here," Luber said. "I wouldn't say it's my fault when we lose games or it's my fault when we win games, but I help contribute just like the entire team will contribute to a win or a loss."

With this mentality, it's become easier for Luber to fend off nay-sayers. If the criticism is not coming from a coach, teammate or family member, he doesn't find any reason to listen.

"Over his four years, he's grown," said Walker, his teammate and friend. "When you're a point guard on a team like Penn State and you struggle, you're going to get a lot of blame. And he definitely has. But he's done it with a smile on his face and taken it for what it's worth."

Which, to Luber, isn't very much. When told some upset fans have called for DeChellis' job this year in the newspapers and on message boards, he gladly welcomed more responsibility.

"Blame it on me, too," he said. "Call for my job."