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T H E 2 0 1 9 S E A S O N t about the same time that Penn State's team buses were pulling up to Kinnick Stadium in ad- vance of a nationally televised prime time matchup with Iowa in mid-October, Mississippi State was quietly returning home to Starkville after a noon game at Tennessee. Among their number was one of the Nittany Lions' former quarterbacks, Tommy Stevens. The mood on the flight home was presumably somber. It had been a rough afternoon in Knoxville. Stevens had been the Nittany Lions' projected starter before transferring in the spring. He had won the Bull- dogs' starting job in preseason camp and had gotten off to a hot start in their first two games. But the offense started to bog down as the year went on, and Stevens' biggest problem at Penn State – a bad-luck streak when it came to injuries – resurfaced at his new school. He was knocked out of games against Southern Mis- sissippi and Auburn, and while he returned to the starting lineup at Tennessee, the team's offensive woes returned, too. When Stevens threw two early interceptions against the Volunteers, head coach Joe Moorhead pulled him in the second quarter. The former Nit- tany Lion was forced to watch from the side- line as the Vols pulled off a 20-10 upset, ending a six-game losing streak against Foot- ball Bowl Subdivision opponents. Stevens had left Penn State in the hope of maximizing his one remaining season of football eligibility. What better place than Mississippi State? It was home to Moorhead, his former Penn State offensive coordinator who had taken over the Bulldogs' program the previous year. It was a Southeastern Conference school, which meant that he was going to be testing himself against some of the best defenses in the country. And it didn't have an established quarterback blocking his path to playing time. Three-year starter Nick Fitzgerald had graduated, leaving only Keytaon Thompson and Garrett Shrader. Thompson had backed up Fitzgerald for two seasons but was not considered the heir apparent. Shrader was a four-star prospect, but he was also a true freshman. After backing up Trace McSorley for three seasons at Penn State and then receiving no definitive assurances that the job was his following McSorley's graduation, everything seemed to be going Stevens' way. But aside from his victory in the battle for the start- ing position this past August, very little has gone as anyone in Starkville had hoped. As of this writing, Stevens had split time with Shrader, completing 67 of 108 passes for 769 yards, with seven touchdowns and five interceptions in seven games. With the season winding down, the competition between he and Shrader was so close that Moor- head was describing them as "QB 1A and QB 1B." We'll never know how Stevens would have fared had he opted to play out his final season at Penn State. Nor will we ever know how the Nittany Lions would have fared with him as their starting QB instead of Sean Clifford. Maybe they would have gotten off to the same 9-1 start that they FUTURE PROOF Sean Clifford's ongoing development at the quarterback position has been a major factor in the Nittany Lions' success this fall, and its impact will be felt beyond the current season FAST START Heading into Penn State's game against In- diana, Clifford was ranked first in the Big Ten in total offense with an average of 287.8 yards per game. Photo by Steve Manuel A

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