The monsoon-like rains that drenched Beaver Stadium let up considerably by halftime of Saturday’s game.
But on the field, the pounding got worse.
As it was, Penn State may have led by two touchdowns at the half, but the floodgates didn’t open up until the second half.
And by the time it was all over, the Nittany Lions beat Kent State, 34-0, to up their record to 3-1 heading into a bye week before opening Big Ten Conference play in two weeks at Indiana.
For Penn State, the game was won by land and by a defense that head coach Bill O’Brien was glad to see. The second half told the story for Penn State – on both sides of the ball.
The Nittany Lions’ offense pounded the Golden Flash on the ground in the second half, running for 213 of their 287 yards over the final two quarters. PSU was so dominating against Kent State (now 1-3, after getting trounced 45-13 at LSU last week) that it was of little consequence that freshman quarterback Christian Hackenberg completed just 2 of 14 second-half passes — showing that, yes indeed, he does not walk on water.
And the Nittany Lions’ ground game was complemented by a water-tight Penn State defense that was rarely complimented this past week, following Penn State’s 34-31 loss at home to Central Florida. Through four games, the PSU defense has surrendered only seven touchdowns and has yielded just 58 points – an average of 14.5 points per contest.
About two-thirds of the way through his post-game press conference, O’Brien pointed to a room full of media types and pointed out that they had yet to answer ask a question about the Penn State defense.
“The defense pitched a shutout,” said Bill O’Brien, now 11-5 after an NFL regular-season-sized 16 games at Penn State. “They did a helluva job.”
There was no question that the defense, directed by coordinator John Butler, had handled a flood of external criticism. But the Lions and their coaches’ answer was to do what the Penn State football team has done in the face of any and all criticism over the past two years. Ignore it.
In recording its first shutout of the season, Penn State held Kent State to only 56 yards rushing on 24 carries; just 17 of 36 for 136 yards passing; and 190 yards overall. The second half, especially, was brutal. Here’s how Kent State’s eight offensive drives in the second half played out:
One down-and-out: 1 time, when Nittany Lion safety Ryan Keiser jumped a Kent State out pattern on first-and-10 with an interception.
Three downs-and-out: 5 times, with Kent State net-gaining seven yards on 15 plays.
Six downs-and-out: 2 times, one a 42-yard drive that ended in a punt and the other a 32-yard drive that ended the game.
It has to be a confidence booster for the young Penn State defense. How young? Well, when defensive tackle Austin Johnson started on Saturday, he became the eighth Nittany Lion to get his first career start this season. Add to that list Stephen Obeng-Agyapong, who although a starter at safety last season is still new at linebacker – where he started again on Saturday, in place of injured veteran linebacker Mike Hull.
After getting next Saturday off, Penn State enters a three-game Big Ten stretch of Indiana (away), Michigan (home) and Ohio State (away). That will show O’Brien whether his young team is wet behind the ears.
“Any time you win, our team gets confidence and gets more confident in each other,” said O’Brien, later adding: “Penn State football is alive and well.”
Penn State’s three running backs all contributed significantly to the win against Kent State (1-3):
Akeel Lynch ran 14 times for 123 yards – his second 100-yard game of the season. Lynch had just one carry in the first half, but dominated on back-to-back drives in the second half, and reeled off runs of 43 and 26 yards.
Bill Belton caught a 15-yard TD pass from Hackenberg and carried 13 times for 90 yards, including a 43-yarder.
And Zack Zwinak rushed 15 times for 65 yards, with three touchdown runs – his second game in 2013 with three rushing scores. He set the tone (actually O’Brien, the play-caller, sets the tone) – to start the second half. On Penn State’s first three plays of the third quarter, Zwinak ran for 20, 4 and 10 yards.
“I believe in using a lot of backs, I really do,” O’Brien said. ‘We think all three of these guys deserve to play and we rotate them in there. … We try to go every two series with these guys, but (today) didn’t work out exactly like that.”
Hackenberg had a tough day of it, with a fumble, an interception and a TD pass, and was just 13 of 35 for 176 yards passing. On the run, however, he converted two third downs as well as a fourth down. Overall, Penn State was 7 of 18 on third down, and 2 of 3 on fourth down, converting all five of its red zone opportunities.
A watershed moment came late in the game, when Sam Ficken added to the 25-yard field goal he made earlier in the game. With just 2:45 remaining, Ficken made a 54-yard field, kicking the near-record breaker through the south end zone goal posts. He came close to making a 57-yarder last week against UCF. That kick tied him with Herb Menhardt (1979). The record of 55 yards was kicked by Chris Bahr (all in 1975).
Linebacker Glenn Carson paced the Nittany Lion defense with seven tackles, while Deion Barnes had six tackles, a half-sack, a tackle for a loss and a caused fumble. Malcolm Willis and Trevor Williams both had five tackles.
SECOND HALF SCORING
For Penn State, Zwinak came out of the chute strong in the third quarter, reeling off runs of 20, four and 10 yards on PSU’s first drive of the second half. But Hackenberg followed with just one completion in his next four pass attempts, as he failed to convert a fourth-and-3 pass attempt to Robinson.
Hackenberg had a tough time of it again later in the quarter. On a third-and-4 on his own 28, Hack threw just the fourth interception his of his career. On the play, he dropped back and set, looking right, then bounced left and tried to drop in a floater to Robinson over Kent State cornerback Dylan Farrington. Only the pass didn’t float, and Farrington made the pick.
The very next play, Kent State quarterback Colin Reardon returned the ball to Penn State when Keiser jumped a Reardon pass and intercepted the ball in front of the Kent State bench.
Two possessions later, Penn State went almost exclusively to the ground, running eight times and passing just once. The only pass: an incompletion from Hackenberg to Robinson on third down. Again, Belton carried the day – and the ball – and rushed six times for 33 yards on the drive. Hackenberg added a six-yard scramble and a first down on a fourth-and-one dive. It appeared that Belton scored a touchdown on an ensuing 12-yard run, but a review revealed that his knee was down at the 1 (giving him 11 yards). Zwinak dove over from a yard out for the score and a 21-0 Penn State lead after Ficken’s PAT.
Early in the fourth quarter, Lynch got into the action. And how. His seven carries for 72 yards accounted for every yard on Penn State’s scoring drive, which ended with a 25-yard field goal by Ficken. That gave Penn State a 24-0 lead early into the fourth quarter. Lynch’s runs: 43, 8, 2, 7, 5, 3 and 4 yards. The other two plays: two incompletions by Hackenberg.
Lynch was at it again on the very next Penn State drive. Again. Lynch carried six times for 45 yards, including a 26-yarder, but then fumbled on a third-and-three on Kent State’s 15. Penn State offensive lineman Angelo Mangiro recovered for a first down. Three plays later, on fourth and 1, Zwinak ran for a first down. The very next play he scored a TD from three yards out – his third touchdown of the day. The 12-play, 83-play drive lasted 5:34 and gave the Nittany Lions a 31-0 lead.
Ficken’s 54-yard field goal – tied for second-longest in Nittany Lion history – with 2:45 remaining gave Penn State its final margin of victory, 34-0.
HALFTIME: Penn State 14, Kent State 0
The Nittany Lions led 14-0 at halftime, completely dominating Kent State on both sides of the ball in conditions inside Beaver Stadium that ranged from near-monsoon to start the game to a light rain by the end of the second quarter.
Kent State missed a chance to lead early, getting the ball on the Penn State 37 on its first possession after a 15-yard Penn State interference penalty on a 36-yard punt by Alex Butterworth. But a 31-yard field goal attempt by Kent State’s Anthony Melchiori was wide right.
Throughout the half, Kent State targeted Penn State cornerbacks Trevor Williams and Jordan Lucas, with mixed results, as Reardon completed 10 of 17 passes for 83 yards. Overall, Kent State mustered only 32 plays for just 10 yards, gaining 18 yards on 15 carries. Deion Barnes had his best first half of the 2013 season, with four tackles – with a half-sack, a tackle for a loss and caused a fumble. Williams had four tackles and linebacker Glenn Carson had six in the first half.
Meanwhile, Penn State’s offense was saddled with poor field position, starting on average at the 15-yard line (2, 13, 17, 18, 18 and 20, to be exact). But the Lions put together a pair of big-league scoring drives – sandwiched around a Kent State five-and-out) that showed off the fast-paced offense skills of Hackenberg, Robinson and Belton, especially.
Penn State scored first for the first time in 2013 when Hackenberg threw a 15-yard touchdown to Belton, wheeling out of the backfield and along the left sidelines. The score came at the end of an almost picture-perfect drive, save for a wet ball slip-up by Hackenberg that was quickly covered up by offensive tackle Donovan Smith.
On the drive Hackenberg connected with four receivers – Belton, Robinson (18 and 13 yards), Kyle Carter (29) and Brandon Felder (3) – for 78 yards. Belton added an 11-yard run. Ficken’s PAT gave Penn State a 7-0 lead.
The Nittany Lions got the ball back less than three minutes later, early in the second quarter, and went back to work. Quickly. Beginning at its own 17-yard line, the Nittany Lions went 82 yards in 179 seconds, taking 10 plays to cover the distance. Belton was the workhorse in the drive, carrying four times for 42 yards – including a 28-yarder. Zwinak managed the final two yards, scoring his sixth touchdown on the season (equaling his entire 2012 output). Ficken’s PAT gave Penn State a 14-0 lead into halftime.
Belton paced the Penn State running game in the first half, rushing three times for 57 yards, while Hackenberg completed 11 of 21 passes for 142 yards – three each to Robinson (43 yards), Felder (35) and tight end Jesse James (20).
