Penn State Football: Franklin Praises ‘Even-Keeled’ Clifford as Big Ten Play Ramps Up

As Penn State heads into the brunt of Big Ten play this weekend against Northwestern and then a much more difficult stretch following the off week against Michigan, Minnesota and Ohio State, the Nittany Lions will once again lean on the services of quarterback Sean Clifford to guide Penn State to victory.

At this point in his career, Clifford has played so much football in State College that it is equal parts a blessing and a curse for a Nittany Lion coaching staff that knows exactly what it’s getting out of Clifford. There is stability in that knowledge and a predictability in knowing more or less how most performances will go. For the most part Clifford’s biggest knock has always been the errant throw or mistake seemingly out of the blue, an odd dynamic of veteran play complimented by something theoretically out of character for a player with so much experience. Equally true, Penn State’s struggles the past two seasons have not really been a product of these mistakes, but nevertheless the threat remains an odd dynamic for a quarterback who can play so well and yet be at the center of game-changing mistakes.

But to Clifford’s credit he enters the fifth week of the season with really only one gaffe to his name – albeit a pick-six against Purdue that nearly cost the Nittany Lions the victory. All the same Clifford still boasts an 8-to-1 touchdown to interception ratio this season and is completing a career-high 64% of his passes – a mark that if holds, could result in a third-straight season with over a 60% completion rate.

With bigger games on the horizon Clifford’s final year on campus will be defined in the coming weeks and months, but so far coach James Franklin has liked what he seen from his longtime quarterback.

“I think he’s much more even-keeled in terms of his demeanor. I still think he’s having a ton of fun and competing and being a leader and all the things that really he’s done for a while. But he’s just more even-keeled,” Franklin said earlier this week. “He’s not getting too high when things are good, he’s not getting too low when we’d prefer to have a play back. That I see as much as anything.”

“Then I think what you’re trying to do at all positions but obviously at the quarterback position, is you’re trying to maybe — trying to reduce or eliminate those three to six plays a game that you’d like to get rid of, and I think he’s done a really good job of that, of — you look at his numbers right now, he’s responsible for 12 total touchdowns and one turnover, 64 percent completion percentage, and I think that could even be better, almost 1,000 yards, 39 points, and most importantly, 1-0 each week.”

It says something that Penn State can have a quarterback six years into the program and four years starting and that Franklin can – and to some extend feels the need – to praise Clifford for avoiding those sorts of mistakes. Then again Clifford will end his Penn State career with a claim to many different noteworthy statistical categories and his fair share of big wins under the belt. It’s not as though Clifford’s career has been an abject failure, but Penn State’s so-close-yet-so-far season in 2019 followed by two unique odd seasons in 2020 and 2021 has done little – justified or not – to win over many critics.

Whatever his shortcomings might be, they don’t detract from the good quarterback play Clifford has put on display more often than the bad. And the good news for Penn State is that if his current form and decision making holds true the rest of the season, the Nittany Lions won’t be hurting for experience in those bigger moments.

“I think he has taken another step,” Franklin added. ” Those would be the two areas that I would say. I think he’s reduced the number of plays that after the game he would like to have back and we would like to have back or do over, if there was such a thing, and just being a little bit more level. I would also make the argument that maybe those two things go hand in hand, that when he maybe has a play that he’d like to get back, he’s able to get over it quicker because he’s been more even keeled.”

It may not matter this week, but check back in amount a month and see if the trends hold true. if they do, maybe Clifford has rewritten much of his own story.