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Penn State’s 4-0, No. 4 Formula for Success: What the Players Say

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A year ago at this time, Penn State was 0-0. (Its first game in Pandemic 2020 was played Oct. 24, 2020 at Indiana – and the Hoosiers are next up this Saturday.)

In that truncated 2020 season, Penn State only had four wins in nine games. Their last four games. Penn State quarterback Sean Clifford remembers the feeling.

“This time last year we were 0-4, 0-5 sitting in the locker room sad,” he said. 

Now, the Nittany Lions have that many wins in four games, with victories over ranked opponents Wisconsin and Auburn. And they’re ranked No. 4.

Now, says Clifford, “we’re 4-0 and we’re one of — if not, I still think — the best team in the country.”

Penn State head coach James Franklin refuses to talk of 2020. His hindsight is 00/00. His foresight is 1-0. So is his players’.

“To be honest, last year was just a weird year in general,” linebacker Brandon Smith said on Saturday after Penn State’s 38-17 win over Villanova. “I can’t really specify exactly what went wrong, but we know it is not going to happen again. Obviously, by the outcomes of our games so far it hasn’t happened.”

Smith is correct. The proof is on the field. As college football powers have stumbled left and right, Penn State has stayed the course.

With one-third of the regular under their belt — with one tough road opener, a Whiteout and two easier foes – at 4-0 who are these Nittany Lions and what makes them tick?

Here’s what the players think:

1. A 60-Minute Mentality.

“We’re a hard-nosed group that likes to come and compete for 60 minutes,” said defensive tackle Derrick Tangelo. “We don’t like to give anybody anything on defense and we like to score a lot of points on offense.”

The Nittany Lions do not quit. Multiple fourth-quarter goal line stands were responsible for high-profile victories at Wisconsin and against Auburn in a super-charged atmosphere. They trailed in both games.

2. An Offense with Options.

“I love our offense,” says Parker Washington, who had five catches for 148 yards and two TDs vs. Villanova. “It gives multiple guys opportunities to make plays. We’re explosive and gives us lots of opportunities. We just got to execute and make the plays.”

He’s right about the Penn State passing game.

Against Villanova, Jahan Dotson continued his spectacular 2021 season, with seven catches for 117 yards and a TD, while KeAndre Lambert-Smith had two receptions for 88 yards and a TD. It was the first time since 2017 against Michigan State that three Penn State wide receivers had 80-plus yards in a game, as both Washington and KLS had career highs for receiving yards.

Last week against Auburn, Penn State’s tight ends shared six receptions for 130 receptions. And tight end Tyler Warren has had wildcat rushing TDs in back-to-back games.

Now wait, you say. Those are the receivers.

What about the PSU running game — or the lack thereof? Take away the 240 rushing yards against Ball State, and Penn State has run the ball 85 times for only 224 yards, a paltry 2.63 yards per carry.

Yes, the Lawn Boyz’s blades have been a bit dull. But, Washington is still right — O-coordinator Mike Yurcich does have a lot of options. Now, moving forward, it’s a matter of how he deploys them to at the very least to keep opposing defenses – bigger, burlier, stouter Big Ten defenses – honest. With Noah Cain banged up heading into the ‘Nova game, Yurcich’s No. 1 option of choice was Baylor transfer John Lovett.

Lovett, who missed the first two games of the 2021 season for what ABC’s Whiteout broadcasters last week said was disciplinary reasons, carried 11 times for 45 yards against Villanova. Lovett had 1,803 career rushing yards at Baylor, more than the rest of the PSU RB room combined entering the season, at 1,689 yards. (Career yards: Devyn Ford 568, Cain 456, Keyvone Lee 438, Caziah Holmes 227.)

“Everybody in that running back room is great. They all have different attributes,” Lovett said on Saturday, sounding a bit like Dr. Seuss. “Everyone has a different skill set. Bigger backs, smaller backs, faster backs – everyone has something different. It’s definitely a challenge for people to go in there and work.”

3. Complementary Football.

“We’re a group that tries to find that blend every week between the offense, defense and special teams,” Tangelo said. 

Penn State ranks No. 12 nationally in turnover margin at plus 5, gaining seven turnovers on defense – five interceptions, two fumble recoveries – while only losing the ball twice on offense, both in interceptions. 

In other key categories, Penn State’s offense and defense both rank high. In the red zone, the Penn State is ranked 10th nationally (61.5%), while the offense is ranked 30th (92.3%). In passing efficiency, the Nittany Lion offense ranks 19th, while the defense ranks 12th. And in scoring, the Penn State defense is No. 12 (15 points per game), while the offense is 56th (31.5)

Jordan Stout ranks seventh in the country in punting (49.2 yards), is a beast on kickoffs (24 of 25 have been touchbacks) and is solid, but not spectacular on field goals and PATs.

4. Defense Wins Championships.

Franklin himself believes in the defense; he has already called it championship caliber.

“We want to be the best secondary in the nation,” says safety Ji’Ayir Brown, who had one interception and had another one wiped out due to a penalty against Villanova. We think about ourselves as the best secondary the nation. We want to solidify that. We want to best defense in the nation as well.”

In addition to the high rankings noted above, the Penn State defense is No. 21 in interceptions, with five. In 2020, the Nittany Lions’ defense gave up 27.7 points per game, including four games where it gave up 35 or more. The 15 per game in 2021 is nearly half that.

5. A New Attitude.

One source of this team’s success and resolve is an attitude emohasized by Franklin during the offseason.

“We’re not just letting any little thing slide,” Smith said. “From you being in a certain spot when the clock hits a certain number before practice. It’s little things like that we really pay attention to.

 “Winter workouts, summer workouts definitely tested you. Are you going to rise to it or are you going to fall and break?

“The bend but not break attitude comes from that. We’ve been through a lot tougher things than what we see on the field, from a physical and mental standpoint. When you add scheme and add fans and a whole bunch of different crowd noise you just have to revert back to your training. That’s what we trained for.”

6. A Tight-Knight Team

Many of the transfers have a big role on the field and a big voice off it. Half of the players that Penn State’s PR team literally trotted out onto the Beaver Stadium turf after the game speaks to that. Four of the nine team spokesmen after the game were new to Penn State: Tangelo, Lovett, guard Eric Wilson (Harvard) and D-end Arnold Ebiketie (Temple).

“I would say the biggest strides we’ve made are in the camaraderie on the team – like myself and John (Lovett),” says Tangelo. “We were the new guys on the team. “They did a good job of integrating us onto the team. And then we adapted the ideals and values of the team. We made that stride because everyone is om the same page. Everybody knows what’s wrong and what’s right, how we want to be, how we want to operate, how we want to conduct ourselves. I definitely feel like everybody is on the same page.

“We love to play together. We’re the closest group of guys.”