Blue White Illustrated

SOUTHERN EXPOSURE | Penn State has a short but eventful history with its upcoming Citrus Bowl opponent I f it weren't for Kentucky football, Penn State's famous cheer and the close ties the Nittany Lions have with the Fiesta Bowl would not be the same. These little gems of information and more can all be traced back to the four regular-season games the teams played from 1975-78. They split those four matchups, with each team winning one at home and one away. Their only other game, on New Year's Day in the 1999 Outback Bowl, is better known by Penn State fans, and not just because it was the most recent. Kentucky's quarterback was Heisman Trophy :nalist Tim Couch, who would become the NFL's No. 1 dra; choice (by Cleveland). He lived up to his hype in the :rst quarter, throw- ing for two touchdowns that gave Kentucky a stunning 14-3 lead. But the rest of the game belonged to Penn State and especially its aggressive, sack-happy defense, which harassed and over- whelmed Couch and his Wildcats in a convincing 30-14 victory. To understand the signi:cance and consequences of that four-game series in the 1970s, one must delve into the history of Penn State football games against teams from the Southeastern Conference. Before the SEC was formed in 1932 with 13 teams, including Kentucky, Penn State had already played charter member Geor- gia Tech four times from 1921 to '25 but no other Southern team. The :rst and last games were in New York, with the Lions winning the :rst, 28-7, at the Polo Grounds and losing the second, 16-7, at Yankee Stadium. Penn State's 7-0 win in 1923 was at Beaver Field. The next year, the Lions ventured into the Deep South for the :rst time and lost, 15-13, in At- lanta. They would not return to that part of the country for a regular-season game until facing Georgia Tech in 1966, two years a;er Tech le; the SEC. Penn State lost that game, too, 21-0. Tennessee-based Sewanee, also known as The University of the South, was a charter member of the SEC until 1964, and in 1932 its football team visited Beaver Field. Penn State won, 18-6. Racism is part of the reason Penn State did not play Southern, segregated teams. In the :rst half of the 20th century, there were several occasions when college teams canceled games against segregated teams or did not use their black players in certain games. Penn State wasn't pure. Although it had played against teams with black players as far back as 1914, it wasn't until 1941 that the Lions had African-American players on their own roster. That year, the Alston brothers of Midland, Pa., played on the freshman team. Dave, the oldest, was a triple- threat quarterback who seemed headed for national stardom before he died sud- denly before the 1942 season of compli- cations from a routine appendectomy. Dave's brother Harry later le; school. In 1945, Wally Triplett, then a freshman, became the :rst black player to start a var- sity game for the Lions. The next season in a now-famous incident, Penn State play- ers voted unanimously to cancel a game at segregated Miami because Miami would not allow the Lions' black players, Triplett and Denny Hoggard, to play in the game. P O S T S E A S O N P R E V I E W >> P E N N S T A T E V S . K E N T U C K Y WILDCAT STRIKE Quarterback Chuck Fusina wasn't able to engineer a victory over Kentucky in 1977. The Lions' 24-20 loss was their only setback in an 11-1 season. Photo courtesy of Pattee and Paterno Library Archives

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