Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1480138
O C T O B E R 2 0 2 2 6 3 W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M Only one of those intersectional games — a 35-29 victory over the Wolfpack — was decided by fewer than two touchdowns, and the Lions finished with a 16-9 victory over LSU in the Orange Bowl. Along the way, tailback John Cappelletti claimed Penn State's first and only Heis- man Trophy Did any of that matter when the na- tional title was being decided? Not even a little. The Lions finished fifth in the AP rankings. They didn't get a single No. 1 vote that year and ended up trailing three teams — No. 2 Ohio State, No. 3 Okla- homa and No. 4 Alabama — that had blemishes on their records. THE MOMENTUM SHIFTS Given those experiences, it was hardly surprising when Paterno began pounding the table for a playoff in college football. Nor was it surprising when he and his fellow playoff advocates met stiff resis- tance. The bowls had played a critical role in the sport's development, and the conventional wisdom at the time held that any playoff system, no matter how limited in scope, would devalue those traditional postseason games. Paterno didn't buy that argument, and as time went on he grew increasingly confident that momentum was shifting in his direction. "Playoffs will come," he wrote in his autobiography. "The more that televised bowl games succeed in making football fans out of more Americans, the more these fans will demand a clear and ra- tional system for choosing a real cham- pion. The present system of bowl games should — and surely will — be a solid part, a foundation of playoffs. The bowls don't have anything to be afraid of." Paterno penned those words in the late 1980s, and while it took roughly a quar- ter century, they did eventually prove prophetic. The semifinals of the inaugu- ral College Football Playoff took place on Jan. 1, 2015, with the first pitting Oregon against Florida State in the Rose Bowl and the second featuring Ohio State and Alabama in the Sugar Bowl. Ever since, the semifinal games have rotated be- tween the Rose, Sugar, Orange, Cotton, Fiesta and Peach bowls. The next iteration of the playoff will continue to use bowls for the semifinals, with the championship game taking place at a neutral site. The expansion figures to be a boon to Penn State, which has yet to earn a play- off berth but has four times been ranked among the top 12 teams in the CFP poll heading into the postseason. That in- cludes the 2016 season when Penn State won the Big Ten title but was excluded from the field in favor of Ohio State. "We won the Big Ten championship in arguably one of the top two conferences, if not the best conference, in all of college football, and were left out," Franklin said. "I think [expansion] helps resolve some of those issues." 'THIS YEAR, LET'S VOTE' Even without a playoff, Paterno won a pair of national championships. The first of those titles came in 1982 when the Nittany Lions, in a strange twist of fate, finished the regular season with a loss but ended up outpolling an undefeated team. PSU lost on the road to fourth-ranked Alabama in early October but finished the regular season with wins over No. 13 Notre Dame and No. 5 Pitt and ma- neuvered back to second in the polls just in time to set up a showdown with top- ranked Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. The Lions outlasted the Bulldogs and their Heisman Trophy-winning tailback Herschel Walker that night, winning 27-23. Players jabbed their index fingers in the air as they carried Paterno off the field, confident that their victory over the nation's top-ranked team would keep the pollsters from choosing SMU, which had finished 11-0-1. They were right. SMU got nine first- place votes, while Nebraska got two. Penn State got 44. After the game, Paterno was asked by Sports Illustrated about his longstanding support for a playoff system to determine the champion. "Next year, let there be a playoff," he said. "This year, let's vote." ■