Penn State looking to bounce back against IU

BY BRAD HURLEY

BHURLEY@TNONLINE.COM

Sometimes in football things just don’t go your way. Sometimes a team does things that are just uncharacteristic of how they’ve been playing all season long, and sometimes you just have to give the other team credit.

Last week against Minnesota, Penn State dropped a tough one, getting off to a slow start, turning the ball over and struggling defensively in the first half.

It was a great effort by the Gophers, who produced a great home atmosphere and executed their game plan to perfection. But even with all that, the Nittany Lions still had a chance to win the ball game — and just as importantly — still control their own destiny to get to the Big Ten Championship.

As anyone who is a regular follower of this column knows, I try to stay away from being negative. There are enough columns and writers out there where you can find negativity if that’s what you’re looking for, so I try to keep this positive. That’s not to say I won’t point out something that was an obvious contribution to a loss, but with so much left to play for, it’s tough right now for me to go with “the sky is falling approach.”

Here’s what happened against the Gophers.

• The Nittany Lions defense just didn’t have a good day. They were sucked up all day long in the run game and then Gophers’ quarterback Tanner Morgan was able to see that and manipulate the defense in the run/pass option game and get the ball out quickly to his talented receivers.

• Morgan was great. He finished 18-of-20 for 339 yards and three scores. He got one-on-one match-ups and the Gophers’ receivers simply made plays on the Penn State defensive backs. That’s something that obviously the Nittany Lions will need to get better at as the season goes on.

• Sean Clifford showed his inexperience. Clifford did throw for 340 yards, but he just made too many mistakes on the day with three interceptions, which is uncharacteristic of how he’s played all season (only three interceptions entering Minnesota game). He was gutty at times, he made some nice plays with his feet to extend some drives, but you can’t turn the ball over three times on the road against an undefeated opponent. Clifford simply needs to play better moving forward. If he doesn’t take care of the ball over the next two weeks, Penn State will be 0-2 in those games

• The Penn State receivers need to step up. I think some of Clifford’s problems are on his receivers. There were a number of dropped balls, which can certainly frustrate a quarterback and encourage him to force things.

That’s what happened on Saturday — and still Penn State had a chance to go ahead with a little over a minute remaining in the game. The Nittany Lions were at the Minnesota 25 and just a few plays, and a few questionable officiating calls, away from a huge comeback. But it didn’t work out that way.

So now it’s onto Indiana (Noon ET, ABC), which has been playing well of late. The Hoosiers are on a four-game winning streak and coming off a bye – sound familiar? However, the big difference in this one is that Penn State will return home in a must-win situation if it wants to keep its Big Ten Championship hopes alive.

The key this week for the Nittany Lions will be to stop the Indiana passing attack. The Hoosiers average 308 yards passing per game, which ranks 15th in the country. They play two different quarterbacks in Michael Penix Jr. (1,394 yards) and Peyton Ramsey (1,302 yards). Penix Jr. is more of a dual-threat quarterback, while Ramsey is a prototypical pocket passer, but both if given time are extremely effective. Indiana also has a stable of capable receivers with Whop Philyor leading the way with 59 catches for 813 yards. Four other Indiana receivers have 350 receiving yards or more.

Penn State wasn’t able to get pressure on Morgan last week mostly because it’s tough do so against the run/pass option. The ball comes out quick, not giving much time for a defensive lineman to get into the backfield. The difference this week is Indiana hasn’t done much in the running game this season, averaging just 138.4 yards per game, which is 96th in the country, while the Nittany Lions have the third ranked rush defense in the country.

I think the Penn State defense is going to key more on the pass game this week and let its front deal with the Indiana run game. Look for the Nittany Lions’ pass rushers to have some more opportunities to get to the quarterback. I think you’ll see an improved defensive effort this week. But the defensive backs need to be better and will need to make plays.

Simply put. If Clifford is able to take care of the ball, I think the Penn State offense will have success. Indiana is ranked 16th in the country in total defense and is always tough under head coach Tom Allen, but other than Ohio State, the Hoosiers defense hasn’t seen much speed offensively this season. Add to that the fact that Indiana gave up 40 points in a loss to a not very good Michigan State offense this season, and I think this could be a perfect bounce back opportunity for Clifford and the Penn State offense.

The Penn State offense did win the explosive play battle against Minnesota. That’s what I expect them to do today as well, but I think they will try and establish the run game early with a 100 percent healthy Noah Cain back and Journey Brown, who is coming off a good game last week when he rushed for 124 yards and two scores on just 12 carries. I think the Penn State run will setup the pass and Clifford will have some guys running open downfield off play action.

Las Vegas has Penn State as a 14.5-point favorite.

I think this one will be right around that. My pick is Penn State 35, Indiana 21.