re: Penn State history and perspective on the game

quote:

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Saw Penn State lose a home opener to Texas, then later that year, traveled to Morgantown to watch Penn State defeat West Virginia.

What year was this and the scores to both games, please?

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1990.

I think I understand the mindset of this board. It sounds as though you've been hit with injuries at RB, your QB is young and your Oline didn't play up to expectations. You lost your big games and were less than impressive in a few of your wins.

That's not altogether different from how I see this year's PSU team. We won 10 games and were pretty dominant in most of them. However, our Oline was dominated by OSU and Iowa, which disrupted our offense.

However, it's hard to be upset with a ten win season given what we lost from '08. We graduated 3 four year starters at WR, 3 first team All Big Ten Olinemen, a solid DE and we lost our entire secondary. Plus, one AA DE (Maybin)and another former All Big Ten DE (Evans) opted to leave early.

Iowa was frustrating in that we jumped out 10-0 and were nursing a 10-5 lead in the 4th. They blocked a punt (and returned it for a TD), which would have pinned them deep. Given their inability to do anything on offense, we probably would have hung on and won that game. That play turned the game around because it forced us to take chances. Iowa has a good defense and we made mistakes when the game was on the line.

OSU was mostly ugly. Again, special teams cost us. They returned an early punt to the 10 yard line or so and scored first. We tied it up and it was 10-7 OSU at the half, but it changed the nature of the game. The difference is that OSU was able to run the ball effectively. They were the only team to do that this year.

Aside from those games, we weren't really threatened. Clark set PSU single season passing records in yards and TDs. Royster had another 1,000 yard season. Our WRs stepped up nicely. The D played very well all season.

My assessment of our game is that if PSU can run the ball, we should be able to score some points because I think it will allow the play action to work. Whether that happens remains to be seen. I think your offense is going to have trouble. I think you'll struggle running against our front seven. Also, your line has given up 35 sacks and our D has recorded 34 sacks. If your QB has time, your receivers could hurt us, but I think that's a big if. Special teams is the big variable, IMO. We've sucked covering punts for some reason and you've been great with TH. Finally, if we jump out to an early lead, I like our chances. On the other hand, if we get behind, we haven't been very good at coming back against a good D and might self destruct.

I see a good, close, hard hitting game. If things go our way early, I think we'll win by something like 24-13. If you start fast, I suspect you'll win something like 17-10 depending on the turnovers.