Blue White Illustrated

rush defense, which has forced people to pass more." While it's true that the loss to Min- nesota did skew the numbers a bit, Penn State's pass defense has had its ups and downs throughout the year. Before Morgan went scorched earth and ended hopes of an undefeated sea- son, the Nittany Lions sat at 10th place in the conference in passing yards al- lowed with an average of just under 212 per game. That number just barely put Penn State in the top-third of all pass- ing defenses in the FBS, which nor- mally would be impressive. But when one considers that Penn State went into the final month of the regular sea- son with College Football Playoff aspi- rations and an offense that, while un- doubtedly full of talent, has hit slow patches at times this year, it seemed predictable that at some point the levee preventing the secondary from flood- ing would break. What's interesting, however, is that Penn State's secondary has plenty of ex- perience. Garrett Taylor is in his second S I T E L I N E S B W I . R I V A L S . C O M R E A D E R S W E I G H I N O N T H E N I T T A N Y L I O N S ' S E A S O N Man, James Franklin is good at putting things into perspective while the rest of the PSU world wants light the torches. Anyone who does not think he is a great representative of our even greater uni- versity is just not seeing the life part of it and is only focusing on the game part of it. Things are much greater than the game. Joe knew it and so does CJF. It's a true blessing to be appreciated. I know I have stated this in earlier posts, but I have stolen some of his approaches and I know they have made me a better teacher and communicator with my 12th-grade students (who think they know everything, but know nothing). Great, honest, humble and direct speech after the Minnesota game by our coach. Very impressive considering how much he must have been boiling inside for see- ing that game slip away. PSUinCali I have a feeling that CJF is gonna con- tinue to grow over the next 5-10 years as our coach. I do think he will leave, but when he does, he will leave a major legacy and probably two or three College Football Playoff appearances in his wake. maxxedout I can tell you for 100 percent fact that coaches really don't take the media seri- ously. It's an annoyance that is part of the job, and you say the things you are supposed to say, and dust off the stupid questions. Afterwards, you literally laugh as you and your staff chat about the presser. Facing your team and helping those kids while they're hurting so badly is what's important, not what a bunch of media dopes ask you later on. It's like going to the dentist. You don't dislike the guy, but you would be happier if you did- n't have to see him, and you tolerate the annoyance that he causes you because it's something you need to do. SJLuvsLions We need one more superstar defender. The game has changed due to the spread. You now need a handful of defenders who can sack, cover, blitz, play in space. We are almost there with recruiting, but we need a superstar DE or LB. ApexLion We have recruited a good amount of four-star cornerbacks. Do we think de- veloping those guys is a concern? I am not qualified to make that call, but it isn't like Reid and Castro-Fields weren't highly recruited. Add in Gor- don/Johnson/Ellis/Wilson, two of those guys obviously being true fresh- men, so the jury is still out. My point is just that they have on paper what should be quality talent there. Safety is a different story; I think we had some misses there. SS24PSU I just wish the team overall was more physical and mean. Besides Thorpe and Cam Brown, nobody plays with a nasty streak. That was the hallmark of the PSU teams when I was growing up. If you are going to play in the trenches, you've got to be mean. For as much as I dislike Pat Narduzzi, I give him credit for how physical Pitt plays. They don't have a ton of talent, but they do play a physical brand of football. Grass I understand that people get emo- tional during the course of a game, and you get the "everyone sucks, fire every- one" responses in the heat of the mo- ment. It's the threads days later where people complain about Franklin, etc., that just make no sense to me. Think about where we were in July of 2012. Heck, think of where we were on New Year's Eve going into 2014 when Bill O'Brien was heading to Houston. Imag- ine on that night if someone had of- fered us this: "You're going to get a good young coach. Over the next six years, he's going to bring you to a Pin- stripe Bowl, a Gator Bowl, the Holiday Bowl twice. In his fifth year, he's bring- ing you to the Outback Bowl and you'll finish in the Top 25, and in his sixth year, you'll be competing to be a top-15 team around Thanksgiving." Anyone would have taken that in two seconds and wanted to extend this mystery coach for a decade. Instead, he's given us a Big Ten title, the first back-to-back New Year's Six- equivalent bowls in 30 years and not only gotten us back to being the Top 25 program we were before any of the San- dusky mess hit but has us as a legitimate top-12 to 15 program again for the first time since the mid to late '90s – and there are some on here who want to lam- baste him every chance they get. It's asi- nine. Is he perfect? No. Does he have the perfect staff? Again, no. Has he made us into a program that has exceeded even the most optimistic projections? As- suredly. berg3438

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