Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1276571
T H E K I C K I N G G A M E SPECIAL DELIVERY The Nittany Lions improved in 2019, but Joe Lorig sees more work to be done A year ago, Joe Lorig made an abrupt move to Penn State. He had just taken a job at Texas Tech and had only been in Lubbock for a little over a month when the Nittany Lions came calling. Believing that it was an opportunity he couldn't pass up, Lorig headed to Uni- versity Park and went to work trying to put his stamp on a kicking game that had been inconsistent the year before. Under Lorig's leadership, the special teams units made considerable headway last fall. Jake Pinegar and Jordan Stout were a formidable kicking duo, combin- ing to hit 13 of 15 field goal attempts, with Stout doubling as a kickoff special- ist and sending 66 of his 83 attempts deep enough to force touchbacks. Also, Blake Gillikin enjoyed another strong season as the team's start- ing punter. But now Gillikin and all-purpose return man K.J. Hamler are gone, leaving the Lions with two big holes to fill in the kicking game. BWI's Nate Bauer recently talked to Lorig to find out how things are shaping up. Here's what he had to say: BWI How did you feel like your first year in the program went? LORIG I felt like it went really well. I think I had a little bit better sense than maybe I normally would have had, just because I had a previous relationship with Coach [James] Franklin. I knew a lot of people who worked with him and for him. One of the main things, when you're a special teams coordinator, is the support from the top. Not everybody treats it the same. I had a really good job that I had just taken that I really didn't want to leave, and so I wouldn't have come. Obvi- ously, Penn State is special, I'm not minimizing that at all, but I wouldn't have come unless I felt like the resources were going to be there, and the support from the head coach and the staff were going to be there to build the kind of culture that I believe is necessary to be successful. The number one thing at the end of the day is, how well do we set up our offense when they get the ball to score, and how often do we set up our defense to make it harder for the other team to score? Those are just the very basics of it. And we were number one in the country in special teams efficiency. So that's good. Certainly, there's room for improve- ment. The return game stands out to me from a statistics standpoint. But I was pretty happy. BWI In the post-K.J. Hamler era, with a fresh page for you, what is your philoso- phy on splitting kickoff and punt returns versus having the same guy? LORIG I've usually had a different guy for kick return and for punt return. But I don't put it in a box like that, because we're going to have the very best kick re- turner we can back there, regardless of who it is. And we're going to have the very best punt returner we can, regard- less of who that is. It just happened that we felt K.J. last year was the best at both of those. I ac- tually think we can improve, because people just didn't kick to K.J. They just didn't kick the ball to him very often. And then when they did… it's not OK, NEW CHALLENGE Lorig is looking to find replace- ments for punter Blake Gillikin and return man K.J. Hamler. Photo by Nate Bauer >>