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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Goin’ Postal on Coastal

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Well, the Nittany Lions broke the cherry on another fine season by meeting another fine cream puff, beating the Division I-AA (FCS) Coastal Carolina Chanticleers, 66-10. It truly wasn’t that close.

Speaking of cream puffs and cherries, we promised you a topical guest reporter for each game, and for this game the guest reporter is Ms. Caitlin Upton, Miss Teen South Carolina 2007. Caitlin just remembered to file her report, so this Turkey apologizes for the lateness. Take it away, Caitlin!

Caitlin Upton
Caitlin Upton

Like I’m writing this in purple because it’s totally my favorite color. Hi, I’m Caitlin, and I was way late in filing this report because of the hurricane in the Iraq. (For those U.S. Americans who don’t have maps, the Iraq is like right next to the South Africa, and everywhere like, such as.)

Whatever, Caitlin.

Anyhow, I was totally impressed with the size of Beaver Stadium. There were like over a hundred thousand U.S. Americans there and probably a few from the Iraq and the Asian countries. Like, I was also impressed with the boys from Coastal Carolina, such as! They were way over their heads, such as, but they like played the whole game. And they’re all so cute, I mean especially the big ones. I personally believe that they got some education, you know, the education over here in the U.S., which is what kind of help they need. I cried when they lost but we in the South Carolina are like really proud!

OK, that’s enough, Caitlin! Thank you.

(What the hell did that girl say?)

This Turkey was drunk by halftime, so I have no detailed, albeit sophomoric, analysis to present here. In fact, Caitlin’s report might be the best reporting you find here, such as. Thus, a cursory, opinion laced collection of observation follows.

The offense was impressive, primarily due to the offensive line, which is now the best component of the attack unit, if not the entire team. Through my own wine-colored glasses, I can say that both Clark and Devlin looked good against no defense at all. (I hate the word crisp as applied to passers, so I won’t use it here. Just one of those stupid fucking sportswriter vogue words you see everywhere. Well, you won’t see it here, except in this excoriation. I’ll give you a crisp pass, right up your ass! It’s too late for Crispy Critters, already! I better not see anything crisp out there, unless it comes out of a box of crackers. But I digress.) Our diabolical running game, abetted by our proudly coalescent and suddenly competent offensive line (praise Jesus!), looked good as well. Every time I regained consciousness, Royster seemed to be finding his way into the end zone. The receivers were pretty good as well, but Derrick Williams still goes down too easily. It’s like Caitlin could blow him over from the third row in the South stands, but I bet she blows well.

I wasn’t quite as impressed by the defense. Coastal’s cagey coach’s calculated counter to the aggressive Penn State pass rush consisted of running screens and quick crossing patterns, which were poorly defended by the PSU back seven. In fact, one of those plays went for a touchdown that made the score 14-7 at an early juncture. I didn’t mind the late field goal, but that touchdown gave me some ominous feelings about whether the linebackers and secondary would be up to the task this year.

How often do I criticize the PSU defense? Except for some specific crappy performances (viz., Justin King, last year), I’m usually pretty kind to the defense. I hope I can be kind to them this year, too, but they’ve got to show me more than they showed me in this game. (I know, I know, they only allowed 10 points. Yeah, but to whom?) For the moment, the defensive line is exonerated. Those lads were quick, brutal, and competent. (Crisp? Shaddup!!) Evans and Maybin…awesome. However, we need to pray that everyone stays healthy. Moreover, the linebackers and secondary better come together quickly.

I hope Bowman caught hell for that stupid playground crap he pulled on the opening kickoff. If he had fallen on the ball, it would have been a sure touchdown (albeit scored by the offense, not by him), but by trying to pick it up, he gave it back to the Chanticleers, who dodged a major bullet. Thank you Navorro. You get the first Bonehead Play of the Week award, which I just invented.

It is this Turkey’s opinion that we did not get much, if any, exposure to the vaunted Spread HD. I personally believe that we’ll get some clues this week against the Beavers.

Finally, just a word about special teams. Other than Derrick Williams’ run-backs, I didn’t see anything very special. Even Derrick, as mentioned before, seems to hit the dirt at the slightest provocation. However, the coverage on kickoffs yet again appears grossly deficient. This was Coastal Carolina, ferchrissakes, folks, not Ohio State. They better learn how to cover kickoffs.

The good news is that the boys on offense took care of the ball. I hope fumble-itis is now an extinct disease. I guess Morelli’s departure was a step in the right direction, turnoverwise. The even better news is that there were no significant injuries.

All in all, this Turkey did not see anything that would make me change my opinion about the season. I still think we’re looking at 8-4.

Sorry about the flimsy, anecdotal report. It was the first cream puff of the year and I didn’t feel like staying sober. I’ll be bad later in the week with the poop on Oregon State. In honor of the Beavers, the drink of the week will be the Shaved Beaver. Try it, you’ll like it!

Welcome Chandeliers!

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The opening game of the 2008 season will be played at Beaver Stadium on Saturday, as the Nittany Lions face the Coastal Carolina Chandeliers.

That’s a weird mascot—what do they do, hang it from the goal post crossbar? At least it lights up.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…it’s Chanticleers! Sorry. This old Turkey is dyslexic. OK, so what the hell is a chanticleer?

I didn’t know, so I went to that infallible source of Internet misinformation, Wikipedia. ??? ????? This is what I learned:

Chanticleer [is] a rooster appearing in fables surrounding the fables of Reynard the Fox. The most famous of these is probably Chanticleer and the Fox, a version of which is told in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

Chanticleer
Chanticleer

I should brush up on my Middle English and read Chaucer. Geoff was quite a football fan in his day.

Chanticleer was also a character played by the forgettable Glen Campbell in a regrettable musical animated movie called Rock-A-Doodle. Apparently, it was about roosters.

I went on to read that the Chanticleer is also the mascot of Ord High School in Ord, Nebraska. ???? ??? ???? Clearly, both Ord High and Coastal Carolina wanted a unique mascot. ???? ?????? ??? Enough, already about the weirdly named rooster mascot. Suffice to say that this Turkey appreciates Penn State hosting another foul fowl.

And now, on to the actual business at hand.

I don’t really have much to say about the game itself because it is such a mismatch. Coastal is a middle-of-the-pack Division I-AA (I still call it that to avoid confusion, as that’s what most of you still call it) team playing in the Big South, which I had heretofore never heard of. Penn State is—well, Penn State. So, what I’ll do is give you some little known facts about Coastal Carolina, courtesy of their web site.

  • Current Coastal Carolina Athletic Director Warren “Moose” Koegel played offensive line for the Nittany Lions, where he was co-captain of the Nittany Lions his senior season, was a Third Team All-American as a senior and played on two Orange Bowl champion teams.
  • Senior quarterback William Richardson is the younger brother of former Penn State quarterback Wally Richardson (1992, 1994-96). Wally is now the Associate Director of Athletic Academic Services at the University of Georgia. (I wonder if William can throw the moon ball like Wally did.)
  • In its brief history of 56 games, the Chanticleers have yet to be shutout on the scoreboard, the longest current streak in the Big South Conference. In fact, Coastal Carolina’s lowest single game point total was in 2005 at Appalachian State, with just a lone field goal. (This streak might end. Soon.)
  • Sept. 2, 2006 marked the first game with the new seating capacity of Coastal Carolina University’s Brooks Stadium. The school added 914 seats to the facility to bring seating capacity up to 7,322 for the 2006 season. Now Coastal Carolina has completed ground work in preparation for full construction to start right after Christmas on the new Adkins Fieldhouse. (Hmmm…Beaver Stadium 15 times as many people. Hmmm…which leads to the next point…)
  • Today’s capacity at Beaver Stadium (107,282) is more than all of the attendance combined at all 11 games on Coastal Carolina’s 2007 schedule (93,231). As a matter of fact, the largest crowd that the Chanticleers have played in front of was at eventual national champion Appalachian State, when a then Kidd Brewer Stadium record 23,267 watched the Mountaineers get a 30-3 win.

And now, what you’ve all been waiting for: the first Official Turkey Poop Prediction of the fledgeling season. Yes, folks, it’s that time. This Turkey has no doubts as to the outcome of this game. Although the crystal ball was broken in a Turkey rage sometime around the third quarter of last season’s Michigan State game, it is still functional enough to predict this result. This is about as sure a thing as the last babe in the bar on a Friday night. I looked for a betting line and couldn’t find one. There won’t be one. Last year, the Nittany Lions played FIU on opening day and won 59-0. The result of this one is likely to be similar.

We’ll be back after the game with commentary by our guest reporter, Miss Teen South Carolina 2007, Caitlin Upton.

Post-Fay Musings

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I’m mostly cleaned up after Fay, which turned out to the the fourth largest rainmaker in Florida’s recorded histroy of storms. The worst of the flooding is not yet over, as swollen streams continue to dump into swollen rivers and daily afternoon thunderstorms dump yet more rain on the area. Hundreds of homes in a neighboring county just across the St. Johns River from here are flooded and uninhabitable. So all things considered, I fared pretty well. I still have a home I can live in.

And now, on to Penn State football.

Depth Chart Ruminations

You might or might not have seen the depth chart released by the Nittany Lions for Penn State’s opening game with Coastal Carolina. There aren’t many surprises, but I’ll comment on a few things.

The first slap in the face is Andrew Quarless‘ demotion to third-string behind Mickey Shuler and Andrew Szczerba. Having a lot of potential and good size doesn’t mean much if you’re seeking to star in the next Outside the Lines report, Quarless!

The rest of the offensive line is stable, with the starters being Gerald Cadogan at LT, Rich Ohrnberger at LG, A.Q. Shipley at C, Stefen Wisniewski at RG, and Dennis Landolt at RT. This unit should function cohesively and efficiently. (Which other blog brings you adverbs? 🙂 )

Next, and probably the weirdest, but not totally unexpected, is the quarterback position, where both Daryll Clark and Pat Devlin are listed as #1. On the depth chart they’re vertically juxtaposed in alphabetical order, but so as not to suggest that one is favored over the other, an “OR” is inserted. What the hell could this mean? Well, as RD points out, Devlin already has Zack Mills’ number. After watching Big Ben Roethlisberger line up at wide receiver twice in the Steelers’ pre-season game against Minnesota, it got me to thinking back to the Wonder Years of Mills and Robinson. I’m sure that a lot of you are thinking the same thing, particularly after having watched some of last year’s late season shenanigans and seeing how Clark was used in the Alamo Bowl. In other words, who the hell knows! Jay might just be waffling, or perhaps Devlin’s rumbling about transferring is on the old man’s mind. Nevertheless, in today’s press conference Joe Paterno announced that Clark would start.

“We’re going to start Clark and probably play Devlin some, for sure,” Paterno said. “Clark’s had a little bit more experience. He’s had a really good spring practice and preseason.”

In any case, it will not be long before we see what the hell JJPa have up their collective sleeve with the Spread Hip-Deep quarterback merry-go-round.

There are no surprises at the other skill positions. The Big Three wide receivers are still the big three (Derrick Williams, Deon Butler, and Jordan Norwood), and Evan Royster, Stephfon Green, and Brent Carter are the obvious running backs.

On the defense, the D-line’s depth problems are quite evident, with each position only two deep except for right end, where three players are listed. The starters are Maurice Evans and Josh Gaines at the ends with Abe Koroma and Ollie Ogbu in the middle.

The first string linebacking trio is Bani Gbdayu, Josh Hull, and Tyrell Sales. No great surprises there, either.

In the defensive secondary, Tony Davis has been switched back to cornerback, and Mark Rubin will step up to be starting strong safety (or “hero”, as it will be called until the Paterno era ends). As expected, Scirrotto is still the starting free safety (or “anti-hero”, as it—ah, never mind!). At the right corner, we have another “OR” situation. The listees are Lydell Sargent and A.J. Wallace, again vertically juxtaposed in alphabetical order with an “OR” to signify coaching indecision. I suppose they want to make it a competition—which really belongs on the practice field. In any case, I would expect less drama here than with the quarterback “OR” as there is always room for a nickel back on third and long.

Joe Must Might Go!

Ron Cook of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette opined this morning that if Penn State winds up 6-6 this year, Joe Paterno is almost certainly a goner, whereas if the Nittany Lions do well, finishing with, say, a 10-3 record and a bowl win, it will be harder for the administration to dump Joe. Duh!

That’s why a 6-6 season might be better this season. Not even Paterno’s most loyal supporters could back him after that. Many, if not most, already think he has stayed on too long and that the football program needs a new beginning. It’s not just the 46 player arrests since 2002 and the embarrassment they caused, especially in a damning ESPN report on “Outside The Lines” earlier this summer. It’s that Penn State is a mediocre Big Ten Conference program. It is 32-32 in league games this decade, including 2-6 against Ohio State and an abysmal 0-6 against Michigan.

So be careful what you root for, Penn State fans.

A big season might mean three, four, maybe five more years of Paterno.

Ron will undoubtedly get his share of hate mail for this article, but he speaks the truth. As you know, this Turkey has posited that this is Paterno’s final season, good record or not. It is time and all the signs are pointing in that direction.

Coastal Carolina on the Horizon

It won’t be long now. I’ll be back later this week with a preview of the mighty Chanticleers.