Pitt (2-0) 42, Penn State (1-1) 39
Many of the younger fans of Pitt and Penn State football now know something about this rivalry. A game like Saturday’s, played before the largest crowd ever to attend a sporting event in Pittsburgh (and that’s saying something!), firmly established the rivalry in their minds and enhanced it in the ancient minds who lived it back in the day. This rivalry should be continued beyond the current, four game commitment. It should be a permanent annual event.
Big Al Got It Right
No one won the game prediction (who knew?) but Big Al got a couple of things right. He initially felt than it would be a three-point game decided late in the fourth quarter but waffled after hearing James Franklin attempting to play down the emotional significance of the game to Penn State players. Thing is, in spite of Franklin’s benumbing diatribe, the players felt it! These guys played with fervor and commitment — just like a rivalry game. I’m glad their hearts didn’t hark unto Franklin’s bullshit.
The other thing Al got uncannily “spot on” (when did that British bullshit affectation enter the mainstream of American sports trash talk?) was the following:”The Nittany Kitties will sleepwalk through the 1st quarter and find themselves down by 14+ points before the 2nd quarter even starts.”
So, kudos to Big Al.
Slow Starts’ll Killya
A noon game on the road. How long have we been preaching about being ready for Freddy at the opening gun? How long have we continued to be disappointed by the predictable laggard performances in this situation? Well back into the waning days of St. Joe, it seems that this team developed a bad habit that the can’t seem to shake. No exception in this game. It appeared to be headed for a 42-0 blowout in the first quarter, and by halftime it appeared that the Nittany Lions were barely hanging on. How many times has that scenario repeated itself?
Magnificent Comeback
In spite of the slow start, the guys showed a great winning spirit after halftime. They never gave up, scoring 18 points in the final quarter to get the Lions within three points of the hated Panthers.
Mistakes’ll Killya
The comeback fell short, but these guys deserve a lot of credit for staying in the game and giving it the proverbial 110% right until the end. A crucial mistake at the end prevented PSU from being in position to attempt a field goal to tie the game. The blame has to be shared by Trace McSorley, who overthrew a ball intended for Mike Gesicki that sailed into the waiting arms of Ryan Lewis of Pitt, along with the two Penn State receivers in the vicinity whose mindsets should have immediately turned defensive when the ball sailed high. Even if they had tackled or face-guarded Lewis for a penalty, they should have kept him from nabbing the ball. A penalty wouldn’t have ended Penn State’s chances. The interception did.
Defensively, We Weren’t Ready
I told you to watch out for Quadree Henderson. Apparently, the PSU defense didn’t get the message. They seemed intent on stopping James Conner. Pitt played the inside-outside game, and this wasn’t even basketball. When they were expecting Conner to run it up the gut, they would run Henderson and his almost namesake Qadree Ollison (a Quadree and a Qadree confused me) running jet sweeps to the outside, for which Penn State had no answer. Pitt threw in some Conner power runs to keep the defense guessing, and the net result was 341 rushing yards on 56 carries. Conner had 117 yards on 22 carries, Henderson had 4 for 58, and Ollison had 9 for 36. The quarterback, Nathan Peterman had 8 carries for 52 yards. In all, eight guys ran the ball for Pitt. Hey, I told you that Pitt was a running team.
OK, Jason Cabinda was out with a broken hand, so Nyeem Wartman-White had to move to MLB. But the tackling once again sucked. The front seven was consistent pushed around by the Pitt OL, and the secondary must have been anticipating the run on many passing situations when they allowed receivers to wander around in unimpinged upon fields of clover. Peterman wound up 11-15 passing for 91 yards with three touchdowns and one interception. Two of his receivers have familiar names to those of you who paid attention: Quadree Henderson and James Conner.
PSU Offense Rules
McSorley spread the ball around to eight wide receivers and finished 24-35 for 332 yards through the air with one TD and one INT. Of course, what will be remembered most (unfairly) is the interception that ended the game.
Saquon Barkley was the man of the day. In a winning effort he would have earned the game ball. While he fell short of a 100-yard game (20-85), he showed the combination of power running and tricky moves not seen at Penn State since Ki-Jana Carter over twenty years ago, finishing the day with four touchdowns. Unfortunately, his one fumble will stick in the minds of many and certainly will haunt him. Nevertheless, we all need to look past that, because this young former freshman speedster is now a worthy cornerstone of the Penn State offense, one who will long be remembered as a once in a generation phenomenon. One cannot help be impressed with Barkley (no relation to Sir Charles) — and he’s just a sophomore!
Think of what Barkley — and this offense — might be able to do with a decent offensive line! Add a couple of Jeff Hartings and Marco Rivera caliber guys and you might see a juggernaut offense similar to the Kerry Collins teams of the mid-1990s. But we all know where our weak spots are and they are The Five Traffic Cones.
Special Teams Improving
Penn State has a punter. Yay! Blake Gillikan punted five times for an average of 46.6 yards with a long of 69. And John Reid gave us a great punt return of 59 yards. Joey Julius was putting most of his kickoffs into the end zone, except for the one that led to Quadree Henderson’s 84-yard return (oops, there’s that name again). And Tyler Davis was 1-1 to continue his perfect streak. Things are looking up, by and large, for the PSU special teams.
What We Can Draw from This Game
Well, 39 points is the most ever scored by Penn State in a losing effort. That sort of portends an exciting, nail-biting season ahead. Our defense is not up to what we Penn State fans are used to, that’s for sure. The offense, with its collection of serviceable receivers (even Gesicki at this point), a world-class running back, and a quarterback who will get better and better, will be what provides the thrills for us this year. Complete reorientation will be necessary to change our thought patterns from “well, the defense is going to have to give us some points” to “I hope the offense can score enough points to make up for the porous sieve of a defense.”
In short, the Nittany Lions of 2016 won’t be able to outscore opponents with decent defenses; however, there will be lots of watchable, entertaining games with their second tier opponents, like the one you just witnessed.
I’ll be back soon with a preview of the Temple game.
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Joe says
I’m okay with how this turned out and I believe this is going to be fun season to watch this offense. I still can’t believe some of these linemen can’t block after 3 seasons, but it is what it is. On to Temple and I think a better outcome than last year.
The Nittany Turkey says
That’s kind of the way I feel about it, too. It will be fun to watch the offense, especially if they can get the tempo thing straightened out. They might still be able to pull off eight wins, even with the McSorley’s fumbleitis, their deficient defense, and the crappy OL.
—TNT
Big Al says
I suppose a 39-42 loss is more exciting than a 19-20 loss. But it’s still a loss and I’m not looking forward to the 4 or 5 additional losses that are likely this year.
Maybe Franklin will finally realize that you need to prepare differently for “rivalry” games than other games. But I’m not holding my breath – he’s far too stubborn and certain about his coaching philosophies. He got outcoached by Narduzzi and he’s probably going to be outcoached again this weekend. Hopefully the talent differential between State and Temple will be enough to make up for Franklin’s shortfall.
The Sanguinarians would have you believe that State’s comeback was a significant display of “courage” demonstrates that the “future is bright.” While it did display courage, it doesn’t mean we’ve turned a corner. Franklin’s teams have come back from similar half-time deficits before (i.e Ohio State in 2014 and Northwestern last year) only to lose that game at the end and then stink up the place in future games. Here’s a fun fact – during the Franklin era, Penn State has trailed at half time 10 times and has lost 9 of them. The only comeback win was at Rutgers in his 1st true road game.
The offense is clearly better but those improvements have been cancelled out by the decline in the defense (now we know why Shoop bailed out). Overall, the team is marginally better because the special teams play, particularly the punting, is better. The only positive I took from the Pitt game is that McSoreley’s arm is strong enough to throw deep on teams that pack the box and use press coverage. However, if his fumbling tendencies continue, it might not matter. I don’t know what the current Penn State record for fumbles in a season is (not that State’s SID would ever track anything negative), but he’s well on the way to setting a new record.
The Nittany Turkey says
As I stated in the article, PSU fans will have to reorient themselves to a different kind of entertainment, which will be painful for many of them. Whereas we used to get off on great defense and mistake-free offense, we now have to accept that the Nittany Lions of today will be scored upon and will make their share of offensive mistakes. That means we have to “settle for” some exciting offensive play, even if it falls short, as it did in the Pitt game. This reorientation will be painful for the many Sanguinarians who continue to delude themselves in to believing that Penn State is just a couple pieces of the puzzle away from restoring the program’s former grandeur.
We will have to espouse an anti-Lombardian philosophy of “winning isn’t the only thing.” That’s a bitter pill to swallow for Penn State fans, especially us older ones, who believe the Nittany Lions are still capable of consistently finishing as a top-ten team, as in the increasingly distant days of yore. Some will make excuses about biased officiating and opponents cheating, but regression to the mean will inevitably put us in the second tier, which is an unfamiliar and uncomfortable place for those who cling to the pre-St. Joe Senility days.
In my mind there is indeed a difference between a good loss and a bad loss when second tier goals are the team’s only plausible aspiration. You can’t expect this collection of meatballs (and I include coaches) to compete for the national championship or major bowls. The best they can hope for is a shot at the Capital One, or whatever the hell it is called now. One extra loss puts them in the Outback, and two puts them in the Music City. So what? None of those post-season games except the playoffs and the major bowls mean anything significant, other than an extra payday, 26 extra practices, an excuse for holiday travel, and a last chance for fans to see their boys before a long football drought. Thus, I think that the object for any second-tier Big Ten team in an expected mediocre season should be to be to provide as much entertainment as possible, take their lumps, and avoid Detroit as a post-season destination at all costs.
McSorley has small hands, but he seems to have a larger brain and greater field vision than did Hack. The latter gives me something to watch, if JF and JM don’t get him killed keeping the ball and running into the meat of Big Ten defenses, but the fumbleitis is troubling. I guess you can do only so much when anatomy is working against you. Couple the flimsy grip with a porous Five Traffic Cones, and I agree that is a recipe for disaster which could mean Detroit or worse.
The defense might get marginally better when Cabinda returns, or it might not, but in any case it will not be what PSU fans are used to counting on. If McSorley can hang onto the ball, we will have an entertaining 7-5 or 8-4 season and a good shot at the Toilet Bowl of your choice.
—TNT
brent l glading says
Not sure the defense will improve given Brandon Bell’s inability to tackle (or was that WR Irvin Charles playing defense) and if Garrett Sickels continues to play like the defensive version of the traffic cones. Unfortunately i didn’t see any alternatives for at one point Ryan Buchholz came in to spell Sickels for a couple of downs but he looked so slow I’m guessing he couldn’t even beat Parise Palmer to the buffet table.In my mind the only thing that kept things close in the second half was that Pitt inexplicably started running in the opposite direction away from Sickels and # 11’s side of the field (# 11 was tackling so poorly I’m convinced it had to be Charles), maybe Pitt felt they needed to give their other offensive linemen a chance to play.
To put the offensive line in better prospective, imagine The Hack behind this line, thank goodness that McSorley is relatively mobile and keeps the opposing defense somewhat honest.
On a positive note I think this team is much more entertaining than the teams we’ve had to endure for the last couple of seasons. If McSorley can stay healthy (big if) he will only improve as should Brent Pry’s game planning and in game adjustments.
The Nittany Turkey says
Thanks for joining the fray, Brent.
I was a bit cynical about the second half defensive adjustments, too. It seemed as if Pitt’s offensive adjustments were of the negative sort.
I cringe when I think of Hack behind these guys for another Temple game, albeit without Matakevich on their side this year.
Looking forward to your comments on Temple.
—TNT
jd says
it irks that me a bit that with over a minute left, one TO, and on the edge of FG territory they took a shot at the end zone. PSU d was gassed, Pitt had all their TOs, and the deep psu receivers were covered.
given of the game trends, i would have tried to get within easy fg range (say the 20) and 30 seconds left on the clock, then take a shot.
yeah, this is hindsight, but i just don’t think that last play was right call.
The Nittany Turkey says
Based on his comments at the PC on Tuesday, I think even Franklin agrees that it was the wrong call, although he hedged and waffled. He knows it. He’s the one who has to sleep at night.
—TNT