With Penn State’s offense sputtering out of the gate, the defense was placed in increasingly precarious spots as Saturday night’s game against Oregon wore on.
By halftime, the Nittany Lions had mustered just three points on 69 yards, averaging fewer than three yards every time center Nick Dawkins snapped the ball.
The defense held up well, surrendering just one field goal to the Ducks and coming up with key stops to maintain a tie game going into the break.
“Coach Knowles was just like, ball’s in our hands, so stay on them,” linebacker Amare Campbell said after the game. “Keep doing what we’re doing.”
Campbell, who had a whopping 10 tackles by halftime and finished with a career-high 15, said the key was simply “doing my job, doing my assignment.”
But eventually, the dam broke and Oregon came out with a 30-24 overtime win in front of the White Out crowd.
“When you talk about how the first half went, our defense was on the field way too much … I think that that affected them late in the game,” head coach James Franklin said.
While the final box score paints a picture of Oregon dominance — 424 total yards and 20 first downs — the tape says otherwise. Knowles’ unit held the Ducks’ high-flying offense to 17 points in regulation, even after questionable officiating aided their final scoring drive.
“I would say we played a good game,” Campbell said. “A lot of stuff that we got to clean up late in the game that we didn’t execute at a high level, allowing them to score. At the end of the day, our job is to not let them score. Anytime they score any points that’s on us.”
Campbell cited Oregon’s frequent usage of 20- and 21-personnel looks and tunnel screens as “two big things” to clean up, but the overall performance was strong and helped justify the blockbuster hire of Knowles this offseason.
But as good as the defense has looked through four games, the loss marred the program’s perception. The Nittany Lions fell to No. 7 in this week’s AP Top 25 poll and drew heavy criticism from fans outside and inside the program.
The group had every right to blame the offense, but instead, players focused on unity and accountability.
“Just gotta stay together, man,” defensive end Dani Dennis-Sutton said. “We can’t point a finger at one person or a unit, whatever. If we didn’t let up how many points we let up, we wouldn’t be in that position. So that’s on the defense, just as much as anybody else.”
Dennis-Sutton was a frequent visitor to the Ducks’ backfield, finishing with seven tackles and two quarterback hits, earning a team-high 79.2 PFF grade. He appeared to get held by Oregon offensive linemen on multiple occasions throughout the game and was visibly frustrated between plays.
After the game, he got choked up while describing playing in his last White Out at Penn State. But even with emotions running high, Dennis-Sutton kept the bigger picture in focus.
“It’s not like they’re not a good team. They were a great team,” he said. “We competed all the way into overtime, so now we know at least we’ve been in those positions. We’ve been battle tested. I think we’re going to learn from this and grow from this, and that’s going to help us later in the season.”
