EARLY RISER O'Brien
discusses the Lions' winter drills following a pre-dawn workout outside
Holuba Hall in February. Emerging from a difficult winter, PSU preps for the first spring practice of its new era FORWARD THINKING
BY MATT HERB matt@bluewhiteonline.com
A 26
fter Penn State's 2011 season ended in Dallas with a 30-14 loss to Houston in the TicketCity Bowl, there wasn't much talk about 2012. A few players spoke
in the postgame media scrum about re- focusing on the Big Ten title and the Rose Bowl. But by the time everyone got back to State College, bigger and more immediate concerns had taken
M A R C H 2 3 , 2 0 1 2
precedence. Penn State dis- mantled its coaching staff, welcomed a new head coach and mourned the loss of another. It was a period of tremendous upheaval that dwarfed the team's day-to- day football concerns. All the while, however, the
calendar pages continued to flip forward. The off-sea- son turmoil gave way to the daily grind of winter workouts, which had been
tweaked – more than a little – with the arrival of Bill O'Brien and new strength coach Craig Fitzgerald. And now March is here, bringing with it the start of yet anoth- er spring practice. The new coaching staff is
going to be using the upcom- ing sessions to assess a ros- ter that it is still getting to
know. There's only so much you can learn by watching tape of last season's
games. And while the early-morning winter workouts offered a glimpse at players' attitude and competitiveness, the spring drills will provide a more il- luminating look at how players fit into the schemes that O'Brien and his staff want to run. Even if Penn State hadn't revamped
its coaching staff, the 2012 season was going to bring significant changes. Graduation has claimed the Nittany Li- ons' best defensive player in consen- sus All-America tackle Devon Still,
W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M Tim Owen
