Blue White Illustrated

UMass Postgame

Penn State Sports Magazine

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that mattered. Improving to 4-0 on the season, while enjoying considerable suc- cess in the process, head coach James Franklin said he and his Nittany Lions embraced the performance. "I'm really excited that we got a chance to go out and play well," Franklin said. "As a coach, you prepare like crazy with the players all week long and then you want to just see them go out and execute and play well and have fun. To me, that's what it's all about. They were able to do that today." Held to Sam Ficken's first-quarter field goals of 42 and 40 yards, respectively, the fun began in earnest for the Nittany Lions early in the second quarter. In a span of possessions that would run from the start of the second quarter through the conclusion of the third, the Nittany Lions produced six consecutive touchdown drives, including four straight in the second quarter alone. The offensive burst was good enough for 28 points in the quarter, a number that matched Penn State's best dating back to a 2009 win against Michigan State. For a Nittany Lion offense that entered the game with a scoring offense that ranked No. 106 in the country at just 20 points per game and a rushing offense even worse at No. 117 in the country with just 75.7 yards per game, the production was well-received. "I think it's awesome. I think it's great that we were able to establish a running game and be able to make some plays with multiple backs and multiple peo- ple," Franklin said. "We were able to be balanced. We were able to take some pressure off of Hack, which was great." Beginning with an Akeel Lynch run of 46 yards in the first quarter, his career long, the Nittany Lions' once-stagnant running game finally got going. Between Lynch, Bill Belton and Zach Zwinak, the three-headed Penn State rushing attack was able to pick up 185 yards and five touchdowns on 24 carries. The running game was aided tremen- dously by a much-maligned offensive line that has faced its share of struggles and subsequent criticism, but the Min- utemen defensive front appeared to be a perfect elixir for the Nittany Lions. "I think we've still got a long ways to go, but I thought we had a really good plan this week in how we were practicing to work on [communication and coordi- nation]," Franklin said. "[During] our walk-throughs this week at the hotel, we were really trying to emphasize that. I wouldn't say a whole lot more than [what] we've been doing all year long, but you keep working at things, you keep a positive attitude, you keep persevering and good things will happen. "It's no different with the running game. I knew it was going to happen at some point. We've still got a long ways to go to get better in all three phases, but it was nice to have some success running the ball this week." The win and the running-game im- provements weren't the only things Franklin had to smile about following the game. Though he had no official stat book from the game in front of him at his postgame press conference, Franklin was well aware that his coaching staff was able to play a significant number of play- ers Saturday a?ernoon and, maybe as important, none le? the field with sig- nificant injury. In fact, along with the 22 starters on the offensive and defensive sides of the ball, Penn State had an addi- tional 40 play in front of the home crowd. And of that group, six were true freshmen. Said Franklin, "I think the most valu- able aspect is that we were able to get a bunch of guys reps. We were able to stay healthy, and I think that's maybe where the confidence comes from: The fact that you're able to play those other guys, and now they can grow and learn from it." While Franklin acknowledged there were plenty of areas to improve upon heading into next weekend's Big Ten contest against Northwestern (1-2), he said his Nittany Lions will continue to learn and grow from the experience. "We spend a lot of time studying our opponent and understanding tendencies and things like that, but in the end, it re- ally has very little to do with that. It's about us," he said. "It's about us and how we execute and how we work together. "Each week, we're going to have tremendous challenges in this league and with our out-of-conference schedule, but ultimately, it comes down to Penn State. I'm pleased with the progress we're making. We've still got a long ways to go, but we're 1-0 this week. We're going to enjoy being 1-0 and we'll start over tomorrow morning, getting started on Northwestern." SCORING SUMMARY 1ST 6:17 PSU Ficken, Sam 42-yard field goal 15 plays, 53 yards, TOP 5:30.......................................................................3-0 2:38 PSU Ficken, Sam 40-yard field goal 5 plays, 45 yards, TOP 2:37.........................................................................6-0 2ND 10:11 PSU Belton, Bill 24-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 8 plays, 69 yards, TOP 3:07.......................................................................13-0 8:48 PSU Belton, Bill 20-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 2 plays, 20 yards, TOP 0:12.......................................................................20-0 3:37 PSU Zwinak, Zach 5-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 6 plays, 64 yards, TOP 3:02.......................................................................27-0 1:24 PSU Zwinak, Zach 1-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 5 plays, 56 yards, TOP 1:25.......................................................................34-0 3RD 8:10 PSU Lynch, Akeel 15-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 10 plays, 72 yards, TOP 5:38.................................................................... 41-0 0:17 PSU Wilkerson, Brent 11-yard pass from Crook, D.J. (Ficken, Sam kick) 11 plays, 41 yards, TOP 4:57.................................................................... 48-0 4TH 14:47 UMass Sharpe, Tajae 77-yard pass from Frohnapfel, Blake (Wylie, Matthew kick) 3 plays, 75 yards, TOP 0:30.......................................................................48-7 S E P T E m B E R 2 0 , 2 0 1 4 B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . c O m 2

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