Penn State 41, Auburn 12

Penn State (3-0, 1-0 Big Ten) added a nail to Bryan Harsin’s coffin at Auburn (2-1, 0-0 SEC) with a dominating second half performance in oranged-out Jordan-Hare, 41-12. A Penn State running game was in evidence.

Are you convinced yet? Penn State is clearly going to the CFP! I know because Sanguinarians are posting crap saying so all over the Internet. Surely, we’ll crack the Top Ten this week! OMG OMG, visions of glory. But I have three words for you: REMEMBER LAST YEAR. Or in otherthreewords, to quote Lee Corso, NOT SO FAST!

Well, we won the war, but did we win the battles? (Yet another overused, hackneyed Franklin metaphor).

Trenches Battle

Among the positive signs comforting to even non-Sanguinarians was the line play on both sides of the ball. The much-maligned offensive line showed signs of understanding run blocking schemata. Penn State wound up with 245 yards rushing on 39 attempts. Sean Clifford was well protected in the passing game, which took a backseat to the run, with no sacks recorded. Meanwhile, the defense notched six sacks and eleven tackles for loss, along with nine QB hurries. Abdul Carter, the latest stud to wear #11, had six solo tackles, a sack, and a TFL. Encouraging performance!

Turnover Battle

The mighty Penn State defense forced four turnovers while the offense committed none of their own.

Penalty Battle

Early on, it seemed that the noise drills Franklin ran back in Happy Valley were ineffectual. In Franklin’s words “we did NOT win the penalty battle.”

Third-Down Battle

Penn State improved to a 5-11 performance on third-down conversions.

Kicking Battle

Jake Pinegar was 2-2 on field goals and 5-5 on extra points. A perfect day for Jake. Barney Amor had a decent day punting, averaging 43 yards on only three punts.

Coaching Battle — ByeBye Harsin

Bryan Harsin is on his way out as Auburn head coach. Five straight losses to Power Five teams suggest it. While this game might not seal the deal, an in-conference loss to Mizzou next week might just do the trick.

As for Franklin, what’s with that stupid fourth-down call in the opening series? Clifford has just had his bell rung on an open field third-down run, and our boy James calls a QB sneak on fourth around the 50?

On to CMU (No, Not Carnegie-Mellon)

Penn State will be favored for the next couple of weeks in preparation for the bye week and the road trip to the Big House. Nevertheless, they must not overlook Central Michigan and Northwestern. This week, CMU blanked Bucknell 41-0, while NWU was embarrassed by Southern Illinois, 31-24.

Around the Big Ten

Most of the Eastern powerhouses summarily dispatched their feeble opponents. Aside from PSU, #3 Ohio State trouced Toledo 77-21, while #4 Michigan mushed the UConn Huskies 59-0. Formerly #11 Moo U. was the exception, being mushed by the other Huskies of Washington, 39-28. Indiana (3-0) outlasted Wested Kentucky 33-30 in overtime, while in the conference’s only high school games, Rutgers squeaked by Temple 16-14 while Maryland came back to overcome the ponies of SMU, 34-27.

Remember 2021

Although there are encouraging signs of life in the running game this year, do not forget how the season went last year. I’d rather forget it, but those who don’t remember the mistakes of history are doomed to repeat them.

We’re certainly favored to be 5-0 going into the Michigan game, just as we were 5-0 last year going into the Iowa game, having beaten Wisconsin, Ball State, Auburn, Villanova, and Indiana. After losing to Iowa, the Nittany Lions were only able to beat Maryland and Rutgers, winding up 7-6. So, once again, cautious optimism is the path forward.

With #11 Moo U. losing, #18 Florida barely squeaking by USF, Oregon kicking some #12 Mormon ass, and #13 Miami losing to the Aggies, there’s some upward movement possible in the polls, which are essentially meaningless at this juncture in the season. Remember, mateys, that PSU made it all the way to #4 last year before The Battle of the Century with #3 Iowa — both teams’ rankings proved to be completely full of shit.

I’ll be back mid-week with a look at the mighty Chippewas! Can we still call them the Chippewas? How about just the Chippies? That wouldn’t offend anyone. Carpenters in the UK and loose women in the US would be singularly honored.

#22 Penn State (2-0) visits Auburn (2-0)

Can I produce post titles, or what? Shit, yeah! Today’s title will make sense for you (or not) if you read further when we delve into trivia after presenting the basics.

Penn State (2-0, 1-0 Big Ten), somehow ranked #22 by the AP, thus raising Sanguinarian® expectations, travels to Auburn (2-0, 0-0 SEC) for the premiere out-of-conference game of the year for both squads. Auburn is coming off a squeaky, 24-16 victory over San José State, a game in which the Tigers were heavily favored, while the Nittany Lions, as you know, kicked some serious Ohio U ass, 46-10. Kickoff is scheduled for 3:30 PM ET on Saturday, which means 2:30 in Alabama.

Going Orange

Le Grand Orange was the nickname the Montreal Expos hung on Rusty Staub, their big first baseman, because he was big, and he had red hair. Ginger. Rusty. Orange. Although he was with the Expos for only three seasons (1969-1971), the locals loved the slugger so much that the Expos retired his #10 jersey. So, just how the hell does that affect what we’re here to talk about?

I’ll tell you. Auburn must have hired Guido d’Elia in the off-season, because the Tigers, big on pageantry, have declared this game to be an “orange-out” in Jordan-Hare Stadium. Yea, verily, with an expected crowd of 80,000 plus, Jordan’s Hair will be bright orange. The Nittany Lions might well feel as if they’re in the prison yard football movie “The Longest Yard.”

King James Prepares

At his media mash-up yesterday, PSU head coach James Franklin said that he was doing whatever he could do to prepare the troops for the environment in Auburn. I don’t know whether he rented an eagle to fly around Holuba Hall, so that phase — preparation for the mighty War Eagle — could be lacking. However, he mentioned the orange-out and something funny going on with the scoreboard at one end of the stadium, plus the noise, so who knows what form preparation will take? I’m hoping that it won’t involve orange paint.

Speaking of which…

Orange paint brings back memories of studenthood at Penn State in the 1960s, when we would do all-night guard duty around the Nittany Lion sculpture on the eve of the Syracuse game. Rumor had it that student pranksters from Syracuse were packing orange paint and were prepared to douse our sacred lion with it. The co-eds (what we used to call what are now known as womyn) set up a coffee stand and a socialization area in front of Pattee Library. I remember it like it was yesterday, even though I had brought a flask of something more internally warming than coffee. Those days are long gone, but nostalgia is comfort for aged old farts like this foul old fowl. So, I will continue to bore you with these digressions.

But I digress…

Auburn is a run-oriented football team, and that spells trouble for the not yet coalesced front seven of Penn State. They better start making some tackles. In the SJSU game, Auburn’s ground attack produced 210 yards. Their leading rusher was freshman QB Robbie Ashford, with 61; in his previous outing against Mercer, he ran for 100 yards. Tank Bigsby, their big junior tailback, had 51 yards on 13 attempts, an off day after his 16-147 against Mercer. You might remember Tank from last year’s game with PSU, where he gained 102 yards on 23 carries.

Quarterback Controversies Everywhere

Auburn is no exception to the requisite quarterback controversy at this stage of the season. In addition to Ashford, there is junior QB T. J. Finley, a huge, 6’7″, 250 lb pocket passer who went 13-20 for 167 yards in his outing against SJSU. His stats in the prior game were similar. Finley was named starting QB prior to the season, but Ashford made his strong presence felt when he was tapped in the second half of the Mercer game. Head coach Bryan Harsin maintains that Finley is the starter and indeed, he is listed as the only starter for the Penn State game. (This, after last week’s depth chart listed Finley OR Ashford as the starting QB).

So, Auburn will give a couple of different offensive looks, depending on who is lining up at QB. Aside from that, here’s more trivia for you. Finley, a transfer portal acquisition from LSU, was the first college football player to sign an NIL deal with Amazon. However, a search on Amazon yields no T. J. Finley jerseys or any other sportsmerch. Speaking of the transfer portal, the Tigers also acquired QB Zach Calzada from Texas A & M. Ain’t the pecuniary world of college football in 2022 just darling?

Ain’t No Defense for Dat

Defensively, Auburn gave up 329 total yards to SJSU, 275 of which were aerial. They shut down the running attack very well, allowing only 54 yards on 29 attempts. In the prior game, they held mighty Mercer to 31-74. Unless Penn State can continue to break Nick Singleton loose on the outside, Penn State will need to throw the ball much of the time. I don’t think you can count on our offensive line to enable the inside running game quite yet, and this team still sucks at converting third downs. Franklin mentioned it in his presser — said they’re going to work on it. Yeah, right.

Famous Alumni and Alumnae

In the old days before all the gender bullshit and sensitivity to gender-specific suffixes, we classified all students who were graduated by an academic institution, without regard to their gender pronoun (he, she, it, sheeit, they, whateverthefuck) as alumni, which is the plural of the Latin masculine alumnus. For coeds (what womyn, women, girls, broads, babes, chicks, wool or whatever were formerly called in the college context), we used the Latin feminine alumna, of which the plural is alumnae. But no longer. From supposedly college-educated idiots of 2022, we hear such abominable utterances as, “I am a alumni of the University of Pittsburgh” (just a random example 🙂 ). This is utter bullshit! Back to the point, I’m simply happy that the Penn State Alumni Association has not (yet) become the Penn State Alumthey Association.

Of course, that previous paragraph got us nowhere. We’re here to name some important alumni of Auburn University. You’re all aware of names like Charles Barkley and Bo Jackson, no doubt. But did you know that Tim Cook, CEO of Apple Computer, is a 1982 alumnus? Well, I didn’t either. No way I’m going to put a picture of his face here, so I’ll move on.

Notre Dame is 0-2

While drinking my morning coffee, I encountered an article no doubt written by a Fighting Irish homey on Fentanyl, desperately declaring that Notre Dame still could make the playoffs. Ever have coffee explode out of your nose?

Da Wedda

The weather in Auburn Alabama in mid-September is always a factor. Our genius head coach has stated that he will prepare the team for the heat (along with the eagle, the scoreboard, and the sea of orange I previously mentioned) by piping steam heat into Holuba Hall. Heat strokes are anticipated. However, this could all be overblown, as a late summer cold front makes its way across the Heart of Dixie.

Our friends at AccuWeather are anticipating a nice football afternoon, with a high of 85 and a RealFeel® of 90. Not so hot, from this Turkey’s Central Florida perspective. So, we’ll have more heat strokes in practice in steam heated Holuba Hall than in Jordan-Hare.

Da Bottom Line

We’ve reached the point in the season at which we think we know something about the Nittany Lions. Yet there are still many unknowns, including weaknesses in tackling and pass rush by the front seven, as well as the omnipresent question marks regarding the offensive line. This makes the Official Turkey Poop Prognostication a crapshoot, but that is what I do here: shoot crap.

The notion of relying on explosive plays is also confuddling. Penn State’s third-down production is putrid, which will bite us badly in close games where the nuclear option has been nullified. I am just not comfortable with an offensive so unproductive on third down. Don’t let 46 points against Ohio U jade you.

Getting there, already…

Last week, I screwed up big time, thinking PSU wouldn’t cover the spread and that Ohio U could keep it close. I learned something from that. What did I learn? I learned that, despite my age, I have not yet acquired the requisite wisdom to intelligently forecast football games, so I resort to bullshit. There! I’ve taken myself out of the pressure cooker, and I can spew nonsense again. (As if I ever stopped…).

The current line in Las Vegas is Penn State by 3 and an over/under of 47.5. That works out to a Penn State victory of 26-22 on hostile turf. Can Nick Singleton do it again? The Auburn defense is not Ohio U, so this is a big test, one that will leave the Sanguinarians crying in their beer. Auburn runs for 300 yards and shuts down the mighty Nittany Lion offense’s plastic explosives. Meanwhile, with explosions stifled, the Nittany Lions go 3-15 on third-down and punt a lot. Auburn 24, Penn State 20. Take the under this time again, maybe, perhaps.

I’ll be back after the big game to give you something more to think about, mister! (Echoing the ancient words of my late dad). Was he wrong to call me “mister” before I made the decision regarding which of the currently available six genders I ultimately wanted to be? Wait, we have way more than six. Calculus is involved, as “non-binary” is a continuum. But I digress…

Penn State 46, Ohio 10

The explosive plays of James Franklin’s wet dreams were abundant on Saturday, as the Penn State Nittany Lions (2-0, 1-0 Big Ten) summarily dispatched the Ohio U Bobcats (1-1, 0-0 MAC) by the score of 46-10 before an announced home crowd of 107,306 (which is always a lie). Two freshmen, running back Nick Singleton and quarterback Drew Allar, impressed us with their big play ability. As always, I’ll caution my readers that this was Ohio U, so don’t get your hopes up too much, but enjoy the victory, anyway.

These young dudes are the future of the Nittany Lions, if they don’t decide to show their shit and then ditch Penn State for a playoff contender via the transfer portal. I should note here that Will Levis, our last hot QB prospect who did not get the playing time he wanted, bolted for Kentucky, where he has thrived. Yesterday, the Wildcats kicked some Gator ass. The moral of the story is play ’em or lose ’em, a sad fact in today’s pecuniary world of college football.

Quotable Quote

The ESPN power rankings put Penn State at number twenty-four this week. In the blurb, staff writer and former Penn State football beat reporter for the Centre Daily Times, Heather Dinich, asked the question, “Have the Nittany Lions found their running game?” Good question, Heather! A question for which we hope the answer is “yes”; however, a few standout plays by a fine freshman running back breaking loose at this early juncture against a MAC opponent tells us little. Most of Singletons yards were gained without much help from the suspect offensive line.

Dinich went on to spout the facts. “Freshman Nick Singleton had 10 carries for 179 yards and two touchdowns, but it was his big-play capability that was most encouraging. Singleton had three carries over 40 yards apiece — more than all Penn State players had combined (two) in the previous two seasons. Yes, it was against Ohio, but the Lions’ defense also was smothering, as the Bobcats only crossed midfield three times. Penn State needed the complete effort before heading to Auburn.”

Offensive Line Tracking

The boys gave up five sacks, plus eight TFLs and a QB hurry. Obviously, the O-line is still a work in process.

No QB Controversy

Clearly, 14th-year super-senior Sean Clifford, who was 19-27 for 213 yards and a TD, is the starting quarterback. However, much like Steelers fans are clamoring for Kenny Pickett over Mitch Trubisky, Nittany Lions fans will be inundating social media with their plaintive cries for more playing time for freshman Drew Allar, who got his feet wet with a 6-8 performance for 88 yards and two TDs. For my money, this year should be a seasoning year for Allar, who represents the future for PSU at QB, notwithstanding the omnipresent prospect of transfer portal desertion. Christian Veilleux also got into the mix, going 6-7 for 37 yards. It is clear to me that, absent injuries to Clifford and Allar, Veilleux will get clean-up duty in the fourth quarter in garbage time situations.

Heather Seen It

The running game was a refreshing presence, not seen by Penn State fans for a shitload long time. With feature back Nick Singleton earning the Lion’s share of the yards, we still must note that the rest of the backfield added 57 yards, which would have been greater were it not for the five QB sacks applied by the Bobcat D. Freshman Kaytron Allen shows additional promise, with 7-45.

Butbutbut Third Down Woes Continue

Some would argue that “explosive plays” obviate the need for third-down conversions. I might be old school, but I still want these clowns to be able to convert on third down. The Nittany Lions were a putrid 3-12 in this game. Improvement is necessary to be competitive. They can’t ALL be explosive plays, so they need some bread-and-butter grinding to move down the field against the better opposition.

Defense

The mighty Penn State front seven were just a-ight, recording but a single sack but holding the mighty Bobcats to one-hundred yards on the ground.

Kicking — WTF?

WTF? You would think Jake Pinegar was a raw rookie playing his first game in Beaver Stadium. Missing one easy field goal and one extra point (which high school girls have no trouble making) I must repeat. WTF?

On the other hand, Barney Amor’s punting looked solid, and the downfield coverage was excellent. Keep up the good work, boys!

Wrapping It Up

Well, PSU covered the spread, just like I didn’t tell you they would. The game was never really close, but I told you it would be uncomfortably close for a while. So, the moral of that story is: I’m full of shit, as usual.

Auburn (2-0) next week. They’re coming off a 24-16 home victory over San José State, in which they trailed 10-7 in the first half. They previously beat Mercer 42-16, so we don’t yet know whether they are any good. Penn State represents their first major test of the year, and you can be sure that if PSU prevails, the Sanguinarians will instantly put Penn State in the playoffs.

I’ll be back mid-week for a look at Auburn and some out-of-the-ass predictions.