Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1276571
eflecting on Penn State's 2019 football season with nostalgia would have seemed unthinkable immediately after the Cotton Bowl. The Nittany Lions had just won a wild, back-and-forth slugfest against Memphis, 53-39, and confetti flew from something approximating twin-turbo engines into the stadium sky above the heads of stars Micah Parsons, Journey Brown, K.J. Hamler, and their fellow players. The victory gave head coach James Franklin and his staff their sec- ond New Year's Six bowl win in three years, their third top-10 finish in the past four, and a third 11-win season. And given the volatility of the program's transition from Joe Paterno to Bill O'Brien to Franklin, those accomplish- ments were significant to Penn State fans who simply longed for some sense of normalcy in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal. Even to scribes with- out a horse in the race, the jarring colli- sion of a real-life tragedy and our happily cordoned-off sports world would reset the standard of what "nor- mal" means at Penn State. In the eyes of many, though, myself included, Penn State's latest effort merely matched the expectations. We all had settled into a feedback loop in which the outcome was predetermined and any deviation from what was sup- posed to happen was viewed with skep- ticism. The program had steadied itself through a hard reset, quickly ascended back into the national spotlight, and as of the 2019 season, had reached a plateau in which cracking into the Col- lege Football Playoff, getting to the championship, and winning it, repre- sented the few final barriers left to break. How normal it all appeared to be until the arrival of our collective nightmare in March with the COVID-19 pandemic, disrupting our lives completely. College football is determined to re- turn this fall, in any capacity, to put on a 2020 season. The reality, of course, is that the Power Five conferences are sim- ply hoping to get through preseason camp in August without viral outbreaks among their players and coaches. If they can do that, then maybe some type of schedule – one that the Big Ten has al- ready downsized by canceling all non- conference games – will be possible. For big-time college football, anything is better than nothing, and its audience is thirsting to see it return in whatever form is possible. In some ways, it shouldn't be all that unfamiliar to Penn State fans, as there are striking parallels to the program's re- cent past. Just three years ago, Franklin put words to a sentiment that now seems especially prescient. In the wake of the Nittany Lions' surprising success in 2016, the head coach was asked about the notion of "assumed wins" and what that meant for the team moving for- ward. The Lions were still banned from postseason play when Franklin had taken over the program in January 2014 and, hindered by NCAA-mandated scholarship reductions, they had to fight and claw to stay above .500 in his first two seasons. But in his third sea- son, they broke through, winning the Big Ten title and playing in the Rose Bowl. Would those accomplishments recalibrate everyone's expectations, causing fans to treat success as an in- evitability? "I wish they wouldn't," Franklin said. "I'd like us to get to the point where we just have so much appreciation for football, for Penn State, for this com- munity, and for opportunities to get to- gether with friends and family to celebrate. "The taking for granted of the wins MUTUAL APPRECIATION The fragility of the 2020 football season serves as a reminder to not take anything for granted J U D G M E N T C A L L R just kickoff and punt, not all three. And obviously, we feel really good about Pinegar. There could be a situation where somebody else could do kickoffs. But I think he can handle both. I think maybe Pinegar could handle kickoffs. I think [Rafael] Checa could handle kick- offs, but it's just hard to take somebody off the field who's maybe the best in the country at it. We've just got to balance all that well. BWI Did you feel like you could quan- tify that last year, in terms of the impact as compared to two years ago, specifi- cally on kickoffs? FRANKLIN I saw a stat that was a pretty cool graphic, a drive start graphic that I saw out there. I think we were like num- ber two in the country in the way this one was calculated, was which was pretty good. The more times that you force their offense to have to go a long field, and our offense is able to start in decent field position, those are the hidden yards that most people don't necessarily under- stand. ■