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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Penalties’ll Killya

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Oregon 45, Penn State 37

I know you’ve all hashed and rehashed the game ad nauseam, so I won’t furtherhash it here. We knew in advance that if Penn State got off to a slow start against the #1 ranked team, it would be an uphill fight that had few chances of ending well. We all cringed as we recalled the myriad playing from behind situations we’ve observed this year, against the likes of Bowling Green and USC. The worst-case scenario would be not only starting slow and making execution errors but throwing in mental errors. Against the #1 team, that amounts to suicide.

Well, we saw all the above. The only thing missing in the early dullard performance was a plethora of coaching errors. No, the boys didn’t need any coaching help to shoot themselves in both feet, repeatedly, like Keystone Cops on a Mack Sennett set. I mean, how in the hell do you get a personal foul on a kickoff that was destined to be a touchback. I WILL blame the coaches for this kind of crap, which we have seen every week throughout the damn season. Why the hell is it still going on entering the post-season?

Four fifteen-yard penalties for fuck’s sake! Some of you like that “in yo’ face” shit. I don’t. In this case, it cost us a realistic shot at winning. After the first one, the guidance from the coaching staff should have come through loud and clear: Control your impulses, assholes!

Turnovers’ll Killya, Too!

As if the dumbass penalties weren’t sufficient half-witted errors to lose the damn game, we had Drew Allar’s two interceptions. He had his head straight up his ass for both. (No, I won’t be gentle. It is true and he will be the first to own up to it.)

The first crappy interception occurred in the second quarter, from the Penn State 11 yard-line already down 21-10. It was not quite a pick-six, but it put the ball on the PSU one yard-line. Oregon easily scored on the next play, making it 28-10. This was a crazy-ass pass to throw into coverage on second and ten from one’s own red zone. No excuses. Just a brain fart.

Similarly, Allar had no business throwing deep to a tightly covered receiver to end the game on second-and-one with time on the clock and the running game working well. He admitted that he mentally committed to targeting his primary receiver and went with him all the way. Another brain fart.

Penn State had a decent chance to win the game, but they screwed up. Losers will talk about officiating like children making excuses for their failures. Blow wind if it makes you feel good, but in your heart of hearts, you know that lack of discipline and patience, the most fundamental of fundamentals, is what screwed Penn State out of a serious shot at this Big Ten Championship. Big credit to Oregon, who played a mistake-free game and kept the game out of reach. They are deserving champions.

Playoff Bracket Revealed

Shfting to the College Football Playoffs, all the bullshit and predictions are behind us, as we now know what the playoff bracket will be. Penn State drew Southern Methodist University in the first round. It will be a home game for the Nittany Lions, which James Franklin facetiously characterized as playing with sixteen inches of snow on the field. Yeah, mid-December games in an open stadium in the frozen North are to die for — literally! But Penn State fans, being what they are, a hardy bunch, are elated that they’ll have another home game. By the time they thaw out, they’ll be wishing the game had been played in Dallas. (I remember one Pitt Game in late November, 1964, after which they had to put me on top of the dorm hallway radiator to unfreeze my balls. But I digress.).

Frankly, I do not know much about SMU. I can remember Shifty Craig James and his PSU hatred, but that has no bearing on the outcome of this game. Also, I remember Doak Walker. (Younger readers will say, “Who???”). But about this year’s squad, I know zilch. Thus, I will make no comments here about the game, snarky or otherwise. I’ll save that for a later preview and prediction.

One thing I can say now is that the Methodists and the Kitties get no respect from the schedulers. The contest is scheduled for a nominal noon kickoff on December 21, in sixteen inches of snow at Beaver Stadium. Imagine the bemused, dullard looks on the team exiting the tunnel into a snow cave. A whiter than white White Out! A veritable winter wonderland! I’ll speculate more about that in my pre-game post.

And was the selection committee expressing a sense of humor by giving us a path to the semi-finals through horses? If the Nittany Lions can cathandle the SMU Mustangs, they have the Boise State Broncos to look forward to (fortunately, not on a blue football field)

So, what else can I say? See you next time, when I lay upon you some heavy bullshit about the first-round playoff game with SMU.

All the Big Ten Marbles

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#3 Penn State (11-1, 8-1 Big Ten) vs. #1 Oregon (12-0, 9-0)

This unlikely pairing of a newbie duck and a dark horse will compete for the Big Ten Championship on Saturday night in Indianapolis. The Oregon Ducks, which were called the Pintail Ducks when I attended Penn State, have led the conference wire-to-wire, and have been ranked #1 in the polls since October. Meanwhile, Penn State backed into the title match when rampant alpha particles disturbed the kineomatic harmony of the universe, permitting Michigan to beat formerly mighty Ohio State for the fourth year in a row.

Sparse History

The Nittany Lions, which were called the Nittany Lions when I attended Penn State, last encountered those quackers at the 1995 Rose Bowl, where Ki-Jana Carter was unstoppable on the way to a 38-20 Penn State victory. I was lucky enough to have attended that game. Furthermore, I attended the previous encounter with the Ducks thirty years earlier in 1964, when this naïve sophomore witnessed Rip Engle’s boys fumbling away a 22-14 loss in early October at Beaver Stadium. Fortunately, I brought a camera.

I wrote a retrospective about that game here in The Nittany Turkey back in 2009. My nostalgic photos show the old scoreboard and the open south end of the stadium, which held about 45,000 back then and had been moved piece-by-piece from its original location by West Halls and the Water Tower only four years earlier. But I wistfully digress.

Penn State is coming off a 44-7 drubbing of Maryland, which included a controversial late touchdown in garbage time. Unkind words were spoken between James Franklin and Mike Locksley at mid-field after the game. Meanwhile, Oregon was taking care of border issues, beating Washington 49-21. Penn State is fortunate to have enjoyed one of its softer schedules, but Oregon’s wasn’t much better. The Ducks beat Boise State early in the season 37-34, and of course, there’s that 32-31 squeaker over tOSU. So, I suppose you can say that Oregon backed into the #1 ranking, outlasting everyone else and winding up undefeated by beating mostly pussies while SEC contenders were kicking the shit out of each other. The same concept applies to Penn State and its #3 ranking. Let’s face it: The Big Ten ain’t all that this year.

Still a Game Worth Watching

Lest I diss these combatants too much, they are likely to put on a good show at Lucas Oil Stadium, but it won’t be another “Game of the Century” between a #1 and a #3.

Oregon possesses a premier passing quarterback in Dillon Gabriel. The sixth-year senior transfer from Oklahoma (and formerly, UCF) set the NCAA record for career touchdowns last month. His completion percentage of .736 stands atop the FBS. Penn State defensive coordinator Tom Allen had better have a plan to disrupt this passing machine who is known to release the ball in 2.5 seconds. Overall, Oregon’s passing offense ranks 14th in the FBS, against Penn State’s 7th ranking in passing yards allowed. In rushing, Oregon ranks only 56th, relying on junior running back Jordan James for the bulk of its carries. He averages 5.7 yards per carry. James is also a capable receiver coming out of the backfield. “We’ll see” how he stacks up against the 7th-ranked rushing defense of the Nittany Lions.

Looking at the other stat categories finds the two teams positioned similarly. Penn State’s rushing game could be an advantage if it were to get going, which is less likely now due to key injuries on the offensive line. Drew Allar is a competent quarterback who, as the idiots say, can beat you with his arm and beat you with his legs. He has excellent pocket instincts, prompting comparisons with retired Steeler star Ben Roethlisberger. What he lacks is one or more viable downfield receiving threats who can break loose from man coverage and stretch the field. Allar relies more on zone-busting short to medium shots, which he typically handles very well.

Playoff Implications

Win or lose, both teams are in the playoffs unless Oregon scores a ridiculously lopsided win. What is at stake here is a first-round bye, which is accorded to the top four conference champions. Some Penn State fans might feel ambivalent about missing a first round home game in Beaver Stadium because the next round will be in the neutral bowl venues. But if PSU loses, the home game could be out the proverbial window if they take a deep dive in playoff seeding. Ohio State might just wind up being their first-round opponent in that case, and five’ll get you ten the Buckeyes would be seeded higher, so the game would be at the Horseshoe. All bullshit aside, the Nittany Lions need to win this game! Just sayin’…

Da Wedda

Does outside weather matter if they play the game indoors? Unless they’re stupid enough to open the roof at Lucas Oil Stadium, the weather is at the mercy of the climate control systems. However, for the record, outside the stadium the temperature is expected to be 34. Advantage no one.

Da Bottom Line

Your Turkey is straining his brain with the Official Turkey Poop Prognostication this week. Looking at Oregon, I see one signature win over tOSU by a single point, and the early victory over Boise State was a three-point squeaker. Similarities to Penn State’s record abound, with only the Ohio State game differentiating the two. So, why do all the pundits think the Ducks are so elite? I’m not buying it.

The betting line opened at Oregon minus three. It has not moved much since then, now at 3.5. The over/under is 50.5, yielding an expected break-even 27-24 Oregon win. However, the unknown algorithm behind ESPN Analytics’ Matchup Predictor gives Penn State a 53.8% chance of winning. No doubt, such calculations are based on tangible stats, not emotions.

Lucas Oil Stadium is neutral turf. However, I would expect the attendees to be strongly weighted in favor of Penn State. Nittany Lion fans notably “travel well”. Oregon, not so much — plus it is a long trip for them but just a hop, skip, and a jump for the Lion faithful. So, Penn State has that intangible going its way, but its injury situation on both sides of the ball is a negative that skews the game toward the Duck pond. So, I’m going with my avian cousins here. Let’s say Oregon 30, Penn State 23. I’m taking the over, but I don’t know why.

I’ll be back after the big showdown in Indy. Shake hands and come out fighting.

A Little Distraction

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#4 Penn State 44, Maryland 7

Maryland drew first blood due to a cold hands fumble by Nick Singleton on the first play from scrimmage followed by a pinpoint 25-yard touchdown toss from M.J. Morris to Kaden Prather. That was the last time the Terrapins would get close to scoring for the remaining fifty-nine minutes of play.

How about another slow damn start?

Talk about slow starts, the Nittany Lions came out flat, as usual, but with more justification for the dullard look this time (if there is any such thing as dullard justification). They were undoubtedly watching their former foes in maize and blue give tOSU boosters just cause for sending Ryan Day on a slow boat to China. If you were sleeping all day, the Wolverines beat the heavily favored Buckeyes 13-10 in the Horseshoe. That’s four straight losses to Michigan by Day, whose day might have come.

More significantly for Penn State, the two-loss Bucks are out of the Big Ten Championship picture, while the one-loss Nittany Lions are in. PSU will face top-ranked Oregon in Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis next Saturday, December 7, at 8 PM. So, the boys were no doubt intently watching a very emotional game that ended moments before they had to take the field. Then, they needed to do a mental context switch. I watched them exiting the tunnel lugubriously as the twenty-seven degree air hit them in the face.

But they would not exit their pre-game stupor for a while. Head coach James Franklin, whose contract was recently renegotiated and extended to accommodate the playoffs (which Penn State backed into by losing to the only decent team they played all year) was seen on the sidelines shaking his head after at least two bone-headed errors. Franklin was unprepared as well, because at least for the first seven or eight minutes, he was not wearing anything to protect his bald pate from the bitter cold and wind. Finally, a sock hat appeared on his head. And finally, the Nittany Lions got their act together and won this one going away.

Such a rivalry, already!

A trophy should exist for this pseudo-rivalry. (It was one-third of a contrived tripartite rivalry invented by retired Big Ten Commissioner Jim Delany. At least the original contrived rivalry with fellow Land Grant institution Moo U has a trophy, arguably the ugliest trophy in the whole wide world of sports. However, the Penn State vs. Rutgers and Penn State vs. Maryland rivalry games are untrophified, begging for some trophy design creativity. The latter could be called the Mason-Dixon Trophy, and the former, the Fuggedaboudit Trophy. But who are we kidding? The real PSU rivalry is with Ohio State.

Retrospective Non-Analysis

Stats are for losers, so I won’t dwell on them. Yeah, Penn State held the Terps to seventy-two yards rushing, but nobody expected them not to. Also, the Maryland passing game, which produced all of 122 yards, was hampered by the injury-related absence of starting quarterback Billy Edwards, Jr. Meanwhile, the Nittany Lions were piling up 412 yards on their way to the 44-7 rout.

Well, that’s about all I can say for the Senior Day game, which is supposed to be the last time these fourth-, fifth-, sixth-, and seventh-year seniors play at Beaver Stadium. That would be the case if Penn State did not make the playoffs, but it seems likely that they will do so and will get a home game in the first round. “Wait!” say the Sanguinarians, “If ‘we’ beat Oregon in the Big Ten Championship game, ‘we’ get a first-round bye.” Yeah, like they have a chance of beating Oregon! I say that tongue-in-cheek. Anything can happen. We saw what happened in Ohio Stadium today.

Another Week, Another Game.

(Let’s concentrate on going 1-0 this week, shall we?)

With my head squarely up my ass, I imagine the oddmakers will install Oregon as the favorite to win by a touchdown or so. Fair enough. They beat Ohio State. PSU didn’t. Undefeated Oregon is currently leading Washington 49-21 late in the fourth quarter as I write this. I do not believe that the Huskies can surmount that big a deficit with less than two minutes on the clock. Can Penn State hold their own against that juggernautical Oregon offense? The Ducks will provide a decent test for the Nittany Lions on both sides of the ball, so to speak. (Another stupid sportswriter cliche).

No matter how it shakes out, Penn State will play a couple more games this year. For us fans, that is a good thing. It’s a lonnnnnnnng off-season.

Now that this Turkey has survived Thanksgiving, I will be back mid-week for a preview and prediction of the unexpected Big Ten Championship game between the #4 (maybe #3) Nittany Lions and the #1 Ducks. Please give me your thoughts before the Big Showdown at Lucas Oil Stadium.