Thursday, March 28, 2024
Home » News » Local & Penn State Sports » Penn State Football: Nittany Lions Get Big Wins to Open Season but Will Need Small Meaningful Ones to Continue Hot Start

Penn State Football: Nittany Lions Get Big Wins to Open Season but Will Need Small Meaningful Ones to Continue Hot Start

This is probably the worst week if you’re a coach. In particular if you’re James Franklin.

You’ve just finished an opening slate that included an emotional road victory over a ranked team to start the season, a win over Ball State to open the home slate in front of a crowd for the first time in ages and then a physical and dramatic victory over ranked Auburn in a White Out.

You’re 3-0, excited, happy and ready for whatever is next. Now you check the schedule and it’s Villanova.

And nothing against the football version of the Wildcats but no game on Penn State’s schedule has looked like more of a lock for longer. And after all of the dramatics of Penn State’s opening three weeks now here’s the game nobody really cares about and everyone wants to overlook.

A trap? Well yes, but also it’s hard to actually picture a path in which Penn State’s talent doesn’t overcome any Villanova enthusiasm.

But then again, maybe thinking that is how the trap is set.

“Right now they’re undefeated,” Franklin said earlier this week of Villanova. “They’re 3-0. If you talk about returning starters, they’ve got 20 returning starters. You look at their history playing FBS opponents, you’re talking about beating Temple in 2018; 2017 they lost to Temple, 16-13. Villanova lost to Connecticut by five in 2015 and they took Syracuse to overtime in 2014.”
 
“This is a team that’s won a National Championship. This is a team that’s played these types of opponents really tough. So, we have to be prepared.”

It’s in these kinds of games in which Penn State’s leadership can shine. The Nittany Lions are such great favorites that VegasInsider doesn’t even – as of Wednesday – list a spread for the game. To Franklin’s credit this has been an area in which his messaging of “going 1-0 this week” has shined. The Nittany Lions have never really lost to a team so wildly worse than them since the 2016 season and one would be hard pressed to call and eventual Top 25 Appalachian State anything other than a good team in 2019 when it comes to close calls.

Nevertheless as Franklin spoke to the media on Tuesday it felt more than he was talking to his team than anyone else.

“Then you just look at this year, and this is a long list, but I’m going to go through it,” Franklin said, about to list upsets of a similar ilk. “You look at this list: Tulsa losing to UC Davis; UNLV losing to Eastern Washington; Colorado State losing to South Dakota State; UConn losing to Holy Cross; Washington losing to Montana, ranked Washington losing to Montana; Vanderbilt to East Tennessee State; Ohio losing to Duquesne; Florida State losing to Jacksonville State; Texas State losing to UIW; Arizona losing to Northern Arizona this past weekend; FIU losing to Jackson State. Jackson State is having a heck of a year; New Mexico State losing to Tarleton State; Western Kentucky losing to Central Arkansas. And then even other games. You look at Central Michigan’s win last week.”

In the long run barring some 99% percentile showing by Villanova, Penn State will win Saturday’s game with relative ease, but it won’t happen because the Nittany Lions simply wanted it to. It will happen because they made it happen. Penn State didn’t thump everyone in 2016 and especially in 2017 due to some casual approach – it did it because it showed up purposefully to do just that.

Get over and get it done with.

So no, Saturday is not exciting or all that interesting, but if the Nittany Lions show up and take care of business like they should, there’s something to be said for that.
 
“We’ve just got to be prepared,” Franklin said. “Got a lot of respect for their program and their university as a whole. They’ve made it to the FCS playoffs 13 times. They’ve won a National Championship. They’re currently ranked No. 11 in FCS. Got a ton of respect for them.”