I said, “Take the under!”

Penn State 56, Nebraska 44

I was off by about 44 points there, as a combined total of 100 points were scored in a ridiculous game at St. Joe Memorial Stadium on Senior Day. A couple of dumbass special teams errors erased the brilliant, 65-yard touchdown run by Saquon Barkley on the opening drive. The Nittany Lions went on to win the first half, taking a 42-10 lead into the locker room. Curtailing the game with a North Korean EMP right then and there would have made it a happy and decisive win for PSU.

Unfortunately, it didn’t end there. The desire to play competitively seemed to cease for the Nittany Lions, who lost the second half equally decisively, 34-14. 

Yeah, the scrubs were in on defense for most of the second half, but Nebraska came out with a renewed desire to win, while Penn State sat on its thumbs. What looked like a sure PSU rout became a random show of offense unbridled by two inept defenses.

Husked.

Saquon Barkley was able to finally get his rushing game on track, as even the incompetent Penn State offensive line had a good day against the even more incompetent Cornhusker rushing defense. Will his 158 net yards put his Heisman hopes back on track. Nope. That’s a past conversation. Opportunity lost. Maybe he’ll get an invitation to New York, but alas, that’s the best he can hope for. The 100 voters might well have forgotten about him after the past four games.

This game produced 1075 total yards of offense. Where was Brent Pry’s defense? Giving up 466 yards tells us something is wrong there.

No lack of credit to Nebraska quarterback Tanner Lee and his receiving corps — they torched the Lions’ defense for 399 yards. Hey, weren’t we supposed to have a pass defense? Wouldn’t you think that a monodimensional team like Nebraska could be solved by a competent defense?

I’m tired of writing about this debacle. As I said, we should have shut ‘er down after 30 minutes.

I’ll be back later in the week with sparkling commentary regarding the forthcoming regular season wrap-up pseudo-rivalry game in College Park.