The Blue White game already has a later start date this year, and now it will have a new twist during pregame and halftime according to coach James Franklin.
Since Penn State’s yearly public scrimmage doesn’t always end with a lot of scoring and punts, Franklin has installed a kicking event for punters and kickers before the game and at halftime.
“One of the things we’re talking about doing….is opening the spring game with a kicking competition before the game gets started just so I can make sure that these guys have got enough kicks in front of a crowd,” Franklin said on Tuesday. “See how they’re going to handle that kind of before the game gets started, just to see how they do, make it a competition.”
“We’re thinking about doing the same thing at halftime with the punters. Do a competition with those guys, because you just don’t know through the spring game if you’re going to get enough live reps and see how they’re going to react in that environment. So that’s something we’re thinking about doing.”
While that may seem like a small change, it’s a good opportunity to see how kickers react with a little more pressure from the outside world on them. Franklin puts his kickers through the gauntlet in practice with competitions, air horns and all kinds of obstacles, but at the end of the day nothing beats actually kicking in Beaver Stadium.
“We’ll have field goal competitions at the end of practice for the running. The next day we’ll have a punting competition for the running. I am glad the snow has melted because we can’t do all these things in the indoor facility. Same thing with kickoff. They’d have to kick the ball into the end zone and things like that and do it for the running and put pressure on those guys to make it a competitive environment. I feel good about it.”
Fittingly, whoever ends up kicking field goals for Penn State this year will take a similar route from the bottom of the roster to potential star as Sam Ficken. With no scholarship specialists on the roster, Penn State is banking on competition to bring out the best in everyone. Currently the Nittany Lions enter spring camp with 13 players who either punt or are kicking specialists.
So it stands to reason that at least one of them can get the job done. Be it frontrunner Joe Julius or punter turned kicker Chris Gulla, whoever gets the job will have earned it.
And for as positive as Sam Ficken’s story ended up being, Penn State would like to avoid repeating the first half of Ficken’s career with whoever is next in line.
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