Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/68104
S P R I N G F O OT B A L L WR A P | PENN STATE VS. HOUSTON Steve Manuel ALONG CAME JONES A redshirt sophomore, Jones has been told by O'Brien that he has a chance to win the Lions' starting QB position. bolted for what he called "the secret back tunnel nobody knows about" so he would- n't have to interact with anyone on his way back to his dorm. He said he didn't want fans P W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M L O R I S H O N T Z | B L U E W H I T E C O N T R I B U T O R aul Jones had everything mapped out. When he got off the bus at Beaver Stadium – clad in street clothes, not carrying helmet and pads like his teammates – he kept his head down. No eye contact. As soon as last season's games ended, he to recognize him and call out, "I wish you'd played." If the Nittany Lions were on the road, Jones was, too – back home in Pittsburgh, that is. Even though his parents had moved across the city, from the Sto-Rox School Dis- trict to the Woodland Hills School District, and he didn't know anyone in their new neighborhood, he didn't want to be in his dorm, alone. He preferred being in his par- ents' house. Alone. "I rarely ever went back to Sto-Rox," he said. "I was too embarrassed. You would have thought I fell off the face of the earth." Such was life as a quarterback who en- rolled early at Penn State, wowed the crowd with two touchdown passes at his first Blue- White Game – at only 17 years old – and then spent the next two seasons academically in- eligible, as the Nittany Lions struggled to find a consistent, effective quarterback. So Jones' problems in the classroom did J U N E 1 , 2 0 1 2 21