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B L U E - W H I T E G A M E P R E V I E W the Big Ten Championship Game, he felt like he was on the verge of the break- through that Franklin had foreseen. "I was so confident," he recalled. "I was back into myself, and I saw how much we had persevered [as a team] through- out the season. I knew I owed everything to the team, to the seniors. I just wanted to go out and make that my best game." He did that and more. Every time he touched the ball, Blacknall seemed to find open field. His two long TDs book- ended the halftime break and got Penn State's offense rolling again. His other four catches all went for at least 10 yards. It was the former four-star recruit's best game as a collegian, and it seemed to portend even bigger things to come. But on Dec. 28, five days before it was set to face Southern Cal in the Rose Bowl, Penn State announced that Black- nall and linebacker Manny Bowen would miss the game. Blacknall was devas- tated. "That's a memory I don't like to think about," he said, declining to spec- ify the reason for the suspension. "But I had my teammates around me for sup- port. I just had to learn from the experi- ence and move on." He's done that, and he said the coach- ing staff has done so, too. "That whole thing is behind us," he said. "We're very big on the process and just moving for- ward – not looking too far in the future, but just taking every- thing step by step, day by day, practice by practice. … Every- thing that happened last year, good and bad, it stays in 2016. We have an opportunity to come back stronger – me as a player and us as a team – and just move forward." Blacknall may be getting set to play his final season at Penn State, but if the inevitable eligibility countdown has imposed any pressure, he's been able to channel it productively. "I wouldn't say [there's a sense of] ur- gency. I would say there's a lot more focus," he said. "There's never a day wasted to get my craft better. There's a lot more focus and [a need] to be locked in, knowing that this is my last year, my last opportunity to go out and play as a Penn State Nittany Lion." ■ IN GOOD HANDS Blacknall missed four games but still finished his junior season with 15 catches for 347 yards and three touchdowns. Photo by Steve Manuel

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