The Nittany Turkey

Primarily about Penn State football, this is a tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

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The Big Question: Can Penn State Stop Jeanty?

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Quarter-final CFP: Boise State vs. Penn State

Sorry I took so long to write this. I have been ill for a few days, resulting in my lack of motivation. However, I don’t intend to spare you my bullshit about this game because it’s, like, important. Frankly, I think the bowl games and the CFP are royally screwed this year, but you knew that. Opt-outs, transfer portal, the almighty NFL Draft, and greed have perverted the whole end of year thing into a charade.

So, what have we here? Boise State beat everybody on their schedule this year except Oregon, who they battled to a 37-34 loss. Their major weapon is running back Ashton Jeanty, whose rushing output was 2,497 yards on 344 carries, a whopping average of 7.3 yards per carry. Against Oregon, he rang up 192 yards. He had six games over 200 yards. His lowest totals are 127 yards against Portland State and 128 against UNLV. He’s scored 29 touchdowns.

So, the big question: Can Penn State stop Ashton Jeanty. They’re going to try like hell, but Carnac is visualizing lots of missed tackles as Jeanty makes his way into the Penn State secondary multiple times. So, the collateral question is whether Penn State can provide enough offense to surmount the Boise State rushing attack. Quarterback Maddux Madsen produced numbers like Drew Allar’s, but he is only 5’10” tall.

For some odd reason, Penn State is favored by 11.5. This screams “overlay!”. Why so big a spread? I have a funny feeling about this one. To get through this round, the Nittany Lions will need to exploit Boise State’s pass defense. Drew Allar had an off day against SMU, so he better have his act together for this one. Otherwise, one and done.

Da Wedda

Doesn’t really matter, as it is the Fiesta Bowl, which is indoors with the field being a drawer so it can get some sun to grow the grass. The roof is retractable, but for the record, the weather will in the 60s and partly sunny.

Da Bottom Line

So, Penn State will spot Boise State the first 10 points. Tradition! We’re a second-half team. All that bullshit! To go 1-0 this week, the Nittany Lions better not be playing out of a deep hole. I’m going to be uncharacteristically optimistic here. I think Drew Allar will be up to the task this week (he better) and the Lions will prevail. Jeanty will run for over 125 yards and will score three touchdowns. However, Penn State will prevail, 31-27. I’m taking the over.

Warm Weather Ponies

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Penn State 38, SMU 10

The Nittany Lion defense ran the warm weather Mustangs out of town on Saturday in the first round of the College Football Playoffs. On a 17-degree wind chill day, the Big D from Big Beave forced well regarded quarterback Kevin Jennings from Big D to throw three interceptions on the way to a most ignominious first-round departure from the playoffs. Whether the Nittany Lions were the better of two pretenders might require a couple of rounds to sort out. In the meantime, I must wonder how the first round of a playoff configuration that was supposed to solve all the problems failed to provide competitive games.

Back to my brief recap, the Penn State offense did its usual slow start routine. I kept thinking, “When the hell are they going to start playing?” And there was a dumbass fourth down call that handed SMU the ball inside the Penn State red zone. Fortunately, that ended with an INT and a PSU touchdown eight plays later.

Poon State led 28-0 at the half and coasted to victory. So, it’s on to the Fiesta Bowl on New Year’s Eve against Mountain West champs Boise State. Fortunately, the Lions will not be required to play on blue artificial turf.

Toxic Bracketology

Let’s talk about this first-round playoff bullshit. Only one of four games was competitive, but even that one, Texas vs. Clemson, wound up with a two-touchdown margin for the winning Longhorns. The weekend started with Notre Dame ushering the Hoosiers to the exit door 27-17, but it wasn’t that close. Indiana scored a couple of TDs in garbage time. Then, on Saturday, Penn State gave SMU the 23-skidoo, Texas handled Clemson 38-24, and the Schmuckeyes kicked the living shit out of those Volunteers from Rocky Top, 42-17. Now, really, CFP? Did you have your heads up your asses when you constructed these brackets?

So, the 12-team playoff didn’t solve any of the problems it was supposed to solve. The top half is easy to sort out, except that I don’t know that including the Mountain West winner is going to accomplish anything other diversity, equity, and inclusion, which is unneeded bullshit. However, let’s see if the Broncos prove me wrong. If Penn State blows them out in the next round, then the algorithm is severely defective. If Boise State wins next week like all the haters think they will, then I’ll shut up. Otherwise, fix the damn thing!

I’m not saying Alabama or Ole Miss should have been included. But I agree with the likes of Joel Klatt, who think Penn State got an unchallenging ride. Would they be around past the first round if they played Alabama or Ole Miss? No one knows. But I believe in my heart of hearts that the game would have been competitive.

SMU has a respectable defense. On offense, they screwed up early, digging a big hole for themselves. Meanwhile, Penn State’s defense saved the day for the Nittany Lions. Not much else to say about the first-round win.

I’ll be back after Christmas with my assessment of the New Year’s Eve second-rounder in the Fiesta Bowl. Meanwhile, Merry Christmas to all of you or Happy Hanukkah, as applicable.

Plow the Ponies

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SMU (11-2) vs. Penn State (11-2)

Frigid temperatures and a dusting of snow will greet the Mustangs from warmer climes on Saturday for a noon showdown with the Nittany Lions at Beaver Stadium in a first-round CFP matchup. To prepare, the SMU players were directed to put ice cubes in their compression undies (which I’m told replace the jock straps familiar to us baby boomers). Freezing their balls is an apt prelude to a mid-December game in Beaver Stadium. State College for Christmas is a vacation destination only an Eskimo could love.

But what about the game, Turkey? Jeez, you get lost in those digressions and you talk to yourself so much that you even write to yourself! Come on, get with it!

OK, I will. Both teams slid in the back door of the playoffs. Penn State got there after a loss to Oregon, while SMU gained its entry with a loss to Clemson. I must say that the CFP committee has done some creative things thing year, and they pissed off lots of people by leaving Alabama out. One of the sports media whiners, Joel Klatt, thinks Penn State’s path was contrived to be the easiest way to the semi-finals, with SMU in the first round, and Boise State ahead if they dispatch SMU. Wild horses, in this case Mustangs and Broncos, cannot bring down a Lion, right?

Bad News/Good News

Well, all bullshit aside, some of the big news going into this game is that Penn State will be without its primary backup quarterback and creative play option, Beau Pribula, who has opted to evacuate State College via the Obnoxious NCAA Tran$fer Portal (ONTP). The NCAA had its collective head up its ass when it decided on the deadlines for the ONTP, such that players on playoff teams who want to find jobs on other teams must miss the damn playoff games. What a piece of shit! The NCAA, I mean, not Pribula. He had little choice to use his additional year of eligibility, which he couldn’t use at Penn State. He is graduating in December.

But the good news is that concomitant with Pribula’s announcement, Drew Allar made a mitigating announcement of his own. He intends to play for Penn State in 2025. Who will be his backup is unclear at this point.

So Long, Beau. We will miss you.

Pribula brought some unique talents to the squad, which Offensive Coordinator Andy Kotelnicki used extensively in his creative offense. Pribula also was an unflappable backup, who could run the offense when needed. We will miss him. (Here, I could have said, “He will be missed.” I would never say that. What is that bullshit all about? It is typically found in vacuous eulogies or reactions to someone’s departure from an organization. Couching in the passive voice tacitly says, “While I don’t give a flying fuck about this guy, some of the rest of you might miss him.” Look, clowns, stop writing, “He will be missed.” If you miss him, say so; if you don’t, then shut your pie hole, OK? But I digress.).

Hey, by the way, where is BOWLing for Dollars this year, Todd? Have you retired from that annual delight? I miss it. (It will be missed, but I digress).

I Can’t Even…

Meanwhile, back at the game, I typically look at NCAA stats for the season to get a gauge on PSU’s opponents’ capabilities versus Penn State’s. Well, those pieces of shit at the NCAA threw me a curve this week by dumping out the season’s statistics and displaying only the post-season. Maybe I’m too stupid to find where they might have hidden the 2024 regular season, and I’m definitely too lazy to continue looking for it. The same people who designed the timetable for the ONTP apparently designed the web interface to the stats pages. Fuck ’em.

So, I’ll pull my prediction right out of my ass, like I usually do, only without any pretenses of statistical mastery of the contest or intimate knowledge of the opponents. This is what hack sports media wonks call “breaking down” SMU, or whoever they’re “breaking down”. In horse racing, “breaking down” has a different meaning, and it ain’t good. In the race chart of this game, we’ll just hope that the Mustangs break down.

Why is this a noon game?

Typically, noon games are for shit teams that won’t draw much of an audience. However, in this case, this game was one of the crumbs thrown to TNT, who is doing CFP coverage for the very first time. ABC/ESPN/Disney and CBS sure as hell weren’t going to give them Ohio State vs. Tennessee, Texas vs. Clemson, or Notre Dame vs. Indiana. So, SMU vs. Penn State got the booby prize. Yay us!

Da Wedda — WTF?

Yeah, well, you wouldn’t even need to look at a forecast to know what we’re dealing with here. And the numbers won’t do your frozen ass any good if you show up for the game. But in the interest of accurate reporting, we’ll say that the forecast we have seen here at The Turkey is a high of 29 and a low of 15. The north wind blows free (how much do you charge?), at the rate of 15 mph, so it will feel like a ball-chilling 17 degrees out there. Precipitation probability is 65%, so there will be snow showers as the pitifully impotent sun ducks into and out of cloud cover. Yea, verily, this will be a balmy December Central Pennsylvania day.

So, advantage to the Nittany Lions, who put up with that bullshit lots more than the ponies from Big D.

Da Uninformed Bottom Line

Here we come to what could be, but we hope isn’t, the last Official Turkey Poop Prognostication of the season. We know that anything emanating from the pen of this foul old fowl this week is laden with sarcasm but lacking in substance. Yet you’re still reading, so I must be doing something entertaining. That’s all I purport to be here — light on information, but heavy on the jokes. I never take myself seriously, and any resemblance between this blog and a reliable information source is purely imaginary. That leads us into my prediction for the game.

I believe the Mustangs have a potent offense, but I believe scoring will be low on both sides due to frozen balls, both of human and pigskin varieties. See, here I sit in Florida, where it is 76 currently, so I can give you a warmed over prediction. Look, at this point, the spread is PSU –8.5. The over/under is 54.5. So, applying bettor’s calculus, we’re looking at a break-even pure numbers outcome without consideration of money lines, with a score resembling 31-24 in favor of Penn State. I’m thinking cold hands, cold balls, and cold hearts will knock a field goal off each total, resulting in my prediction of Penn State 27, SMU 20. Franklin doesn’t cover the spread, but wins the game. I’m taking the under.

I’ll be back after the Glacier Bowl with some sparkling commentary from the warm and fuzzy Turkey living on that penile peninsula known as Florida.