The Letter the First Time Is Always the Best
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VOLUME 76 ISSUE 5 Penn State vs. Indiana October 7, 2013 The Letter The first time is always the best. Follow us on Twenty-one years was a long time for Twitter and Indiana to wait to get its first victory over Check out the new Penn State, after the Nittany Lions joined Football Letter Blog the Big Ten conference in 1993. But when it happened Saturday afternoon, PSU 0 7 10 7 24 it tasted so much sweeter. IU 7 6 8 23 44 The taste of a 44–24 conquest of their nemesis in front of a Big Ten television CONTENTS audience, as well as the Memorial Stadium faithful, lingered all weekend in the mouths of the football players at this basketball school. The Letter Notes from the Cuff Sixteen times in those 21 years the Hoosier gridders tasted defeat, and six of Other Sports those losses were by seven or fewer points. And five of those six close losses News of Note came at home. And those particularly stuck in the Hoosiers’ craw. Game Photos Saturday the taste changed, as Indiana finally pulled off the upset—and did it in Statistics front of the home fans. The same fans that saw Indiana score enough points in 1994 to knock unbeaten Penn State out of the No. 1 spot in the nation and doom it to an eventual No. 2 finish behind Nebraska, but yet lose, 35–29. The same PAST ISSUES fans that watched Antwaan Randle El drive the Lions nuts in 2000, but still come up on the short end of a 27–24 tally. The same fans that watched State’s View past issues defense stop the Hoosiers four times in a 2004 goal line stand to protect a 22–18 victory that ended their fourth losing season in five years and launch a 15-game streak that was marred only by an extra three seconds on the Michigan clock and included a No. 3 national ranking in 2005. The same fans that saw Coach Kevin Wilson’s first team in 2011 scare the daylights out of Penn State before falling, 16–10. It’s only too bad that more of those fans were not present to witness the historic 2013 victory and savor the result. The reported attendance was 42,125 in this 53,000-seat stadium. But that had to be tickets sold, because the wide open spaces, especially in the student sections, attested to the fact that there were a lot fewer fannies in the seats. FAN ZONE Some fair-weather fans may have been scared off by the threat of rain, which turned out to be light and stopped in the first half. Football Schedule Team Roster In all likelihood there were more students among the 12,000 hoops fans at GoPSUSports.com Friday night’s Hoosier Hysteria in nearby Assembly Hall, watching the basketball Radio/TV Listings team put on slam-dunk exhibitions and scrimmage drills than there were in Memorial Stadium appreciating the spectacular play of their football team Big Ten Football TV Schedule Saturday afternoon. Big Ten Standings Big Ten Schedule and Results Penn Staters in the Pros Despite the preference of their fans for basketball and the lack of respect in the football world for this squad that led the Big Ten in passing offense and total offense, the 2013 Hoosiers proved they are a team to be reckoned with by blasting the Lions in the Big Ten opener for both teams. Both teams had a bye last Saturday, while most of their conference cousins started Big Ten play. The Hoosiers obviously made better use of the time off and refused to be denied Saturday, despite Penn State having numerous chances to take control of the game. In the two weeks since the Lions’ convincing shutout of Kent State, Penn State fans got some very good news. Their University was ranked as the 49th best in the world by the Times Higher Education World University rankings based on 13 separate performance indicators. And U.S. News and World Report ranked Penn State No. 8 among all public national universities in the United States. And the NCAA restored some of the scholarships that it had stripped from Penn State in the draconian sanctions handed down last year. But Saturday, Lion fans got some bad news. For the first time since the opening game of the Bill O’Brien era, their team totally collapsed in the fourth quarter and may have doomed its chances of equaling last year’s stellar 8–4 record. Penn State now has the same 3–2 slate that it did at this time last year; however, the remaining schedule appears a lot more ominous. Oddsmakers expected the Lions to enter next week’s Homecoming encounter with unbeaten Michigan at 5–0. Those oddsmakers may still favor Penn State against Illinois, Minnesota and Purdue. But to duplicate last year’s comeback to an 8–4 mark, the 2013 Lions will have to upset at least two of the four ranked teams remaining on the schedule—Michigan, Ohio State, Nebraska and Wisconsin. Just to salvage a winning season, State is going to have to pull at least one upset of the Big Ten leaders. Saturday the Lions controlled the ball for 10 minutes more than the home team, posting a 35:11 to 24:49 margin in time of possession and ran 93 plays out of its NASCAR offense, while the Hoosiers got only 80 out of their even faster no- huddle offense. Penn State gained 340 yards passing to Indiana’s 336. The Lions’ phenomenal freshman quarterback Christian Hackenberg threw three touchdown passes to Indiana’s super sophomore QB Nate Sudfeld’s two. But the home team outgained the visitors 150 yards to 70 on the ground and got three rushing TDs to Penn State’s none. Hackenberg had career highs with 30 completions for 340 yards and the three scores, while attempting a school record 55 passes with no interceptions. Allen Robinson caught a career-high 12 passes for a career-high 173 yards and two TDs and could have had a third. But he was knocked out-of-bounds while leaping high in the end zone and corralling another Hackenberg aerial. Tight end Kyle Carter hauled in six passes for 79 yards, and Eugene Lewis caught six for 35. Sudfeld passed for 321 yards by completing 23 of 38 attempts to seven different receivers with one interception. Cody Lattimer led all Hoosier receivers with nine receptions for 140 yards. While Indiana’s fast-paced offense had exploited its four non-conference foes with 1,394 yards passing and 795 yards rushing to top the Big Ten charts in passing and total offense, its defense ranked near the bottom nationally in stopping the run. But while Penn State’s defense held Indiana’s rushing attack to 49 yards below its average, the Hoosier defense (which had surrendered 444 rushing yards to Navy and 280 to Missouri) held Penn State to just 70 yards on the ground—127 below its average. Granted, State’s rushing stat included a 31-yard loss on an errant snap on a field goal try and Hackenberg’s loss of 19 yards, including 12 on an intentional grounding call. Nonetheless, the Lions could not muster a consistent rushing attack, scored no rushing touchdowns after averaging three per game, and virtually abandoned any running attack in the second half. Actually, the visitors moved quickly from a run-it-down-your-throat mode to a reliance on the pass on the very first possession of the game. After the first three rushes gained 23 yards, quarterback Christian Hackenberg passed on seven of the next nine plays, including an incompletion on 4th & 5 to halt the drive at the IN-26. State blew a second scoring opportunity on its next possession, when a bad snap on a field goal attempt not only cost them a likely three points but a loss of field position from the IN-14 to the IN-45. Meanwhile, Penn State squelched Indiana’s first possession, when backup defensive end Anthony Zettel sacked Sudfeld, and their second, when Stephen Obeng-Agyapong and Deion Barnes stopped Stephen Houston for no gain on a 4th & 3 at the PS-20. But, on their final possession of the quarter, Sudfield crisply raced his team downfield on four straight pass completions of 11, 33, 12 and five yards to the game’s first touchdown. In the middle of the second quarter, Penn State finally answered with consecutive Hackenberg pass completions to Allen Robinson. The second was about a 10-yard toss along the left sideline that ARob promptly turned into a 46-yard touchdown by juking three tacklers on his way to the end zone. Indiana’s Mitch Ewald kicked field goals of 24 and 27 yards to give the home team a 13–7 lead at halftime. State set Sam Ficken up for a 42-yard attempt after driving to a 4th & 2 at the IN-25 on the drive in between Ewald’s successive three-pointers. The Lions had eschewed a 43-yard field goal try on a 4th & 5 in the first frame, opting instead for a Hackenberg pass that fell incomplete. When each team called a timeout before the 42-yard attempt on 4th & 2, fans thought Coach Bill O’Brien might change his mind and try to run for a first down. But not so, and Ficken’s kick was blocked by 6’ 5” Ralphael Green who leaped high and got a big paw on it.