Goin’ Postal on Coastal

Well, the Nittany Lions broke the cherry on another fine season by meeting another fine cream puff, beating the Division I-AA (FCS) Coastal Carolina Chanticleers, 66-10. It truly wasn’t that close.

Speaking of cream puffs and cherries, we promised you a topical guest reporter for each game, and for this game the guest reporter is Ms. Caitlin Upton, Miss Teen South Carolina 2007. Caitlin just remembered to file her report, so this Turkey apologizes for the lateness. Take it away, Caitlin!

Like I’m writing this in purple because it’s totally my favorite color. Hi, I’m Caitlin, and I was way late in filing this report because of the hurricane in the Iraq. (For those U.S. Americans who don’t have maps, the Iraq is like right next to the South Africa, and everywhere like, such as.)

Whatever, Caitlin.

Anyhow, I was totally impressed with the size of Beaver Stadium. There were like over a hundred thousand U.S. Americans there and probably a few from the Iraq and the Asian countries. Like, I was also impressed with the boys from Coastal Carolina, such as! They were way over their heads, such as, but they like played the whole game. And they’re all so cute, I mean especially the big ones. I personally believe that they got some education, you know, the education over here in the U.S., which is what kind of help they need. I cried when they lost but we in the South Carolina are like really proud!

OK, that’s enough, Caitlin! Thank you.

(What the hell did that girl say?)

This Turkey was drunk by halftime, so I have no detailed, albeit sophomoric, analysis to present here. In fact, Caitlin’s report might be the best reporting you find here, such as. Thus, a cursory, opinion laced collection of observation follows.

The offense was impressive, primarily due to the offensive line, which is now the best component of the attack unit, if not the entire team. Through my own wine-colored glasses, I can say that both Clark and Devlin looked good against no defense at all. (I hate the word crisp as applied to passers, so I won’t use it here. Just one of those stupid fucking sportswriter vogue words you see everywhere. Well, you won’t see it here, except in this excoriation. I’ll give you a crisp pass, right up your ass! It’s too late for Crispy Critters, already! I better not see anything crisp out there, unless it comes out of a box of crackers. But I digress.) Our diabolical running game, abetted by our proudly coalescent and suddenly competent offensive line (praise Jesus!), looked good as well. Every time I regained consciousness, Royster seemed to be finding his way into the end zone. The receivers were pretty good as well, but Derrick Williams still goes down too easily. It’s like Caitlin could blow him over from the third row in the South stands, but I bet she blows well.

I wasn’t quite as impressed by the defense. Coastal’s cagey coach’s calculated counter to the aggressive Penn State pass rush consisted of running screens and quick crossing patterns, which were poorly defended by the PSU back seven. In fact, one of those plays went for a touchdown that made the score 14-7 at an early juncture. I didn’t mind the late field goal, but that touchdown gave me some ominous feelings about whether the linebackers and secondary would be up to the task this year.

How often do I criticize the PSU defense? Except for some specific crappy performances (viz., Justin King, last year), I’m usually pretty kind to the defense. I hope I can be kind to them this year, too, but they’ve got to show me more than they showed me in this game. (I know, I know, they only allowed 10 points. Yeah, but to whom?) For the moment, the defensive line is exonerated. Those lads were quick, brutal, and competent. (Crisp? Shaddup!!) Evans and Maybin…awesome. However, we need to pray that everyone stays healthy. Moreover, the linebackers and secondary better come together quickly.

I hope Bowman caught hell for that stupid playground crap he pulled on the opening kickoff. If he had fallen on the ball, it would have been a sure touchdown (albeit scored by the offense, not by him), but by trying to pick it up, he gave it back to the Chanticleers, who dodged a major bullet. Thank you Navorro. You get the first Bonehead Play of the Week award, which I just invented.

It is this Turkey’s opinion that we did not get much, if any, exposure to the vaunted Spread HD. I personally believe that we’ll get some clues this week against the Beavers.

Finally, just a word about special teams. Other than Derrick Williams’ run-backs, I didn’t see anything very special. Even Derrick, as mentioned before, seems to hit the dirt at the slightest provocation. However, the coverage on kickoffs yet again appears grossly deficient. This was Coastal Carolina, ferchrissakes, folks, not Ohio State. They better learn how to cover kickoffs.

The good news is that the boys on offense took care of the ball. I hope fumble-itis is now an extinct disease. I guess Morelli’s departure was a step in the right direction, turnoverwise. The even better news is that there were no significant injuries.

All in all, this Turkey did not see anything that would make me change my opinion about the season. I still think we’re looking at 8-4.

Sorry about the flimsy, anecdotal report. It was the first cream puff of the year and I didn’t feel like staying sober. I’ll be bad later in the week with the poop on Oregon State. In honor of the Beavers, the drink of the week will be the Shaved Beaver. Try it, you’ll like it!