Penn State Sports Magazine
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/847744
the featured back to a balanced, big-play passing attack that depended on Black- ledge and a corps of underrated receivers led by Kenny Jackson, split end Gregg Garrity and tight end Mike McCloskey. Paterno also planned to use Warner more frequently as a receiver, too. The coach never explained everything until he implemented his game plan for the season opener against Temple at Beaver Stadium on Labor Day weekend. Before the first quarter was over, Black- ledge had passed for three touchdowns, including a 40-yard screen pass to Warner for the first touchdown. The Lions won in a romp, 31-14, with Blackledge hitting 14 of 23 pass attempts for 203 yards, with one interception and a school-record-tying four touchdowns. With a downsized running game that picked up just 100 yards, Warner strug- gled, needing 13 car- ries to gain a paltry – for him – 49 yards. Warner sulked in the postgame locker room with tears in his eyes, telling sportswriters he "didn't like being the guinea pig. I ex- pected to see the ball more." Warner can joke about it now and ad- mits it was best for the team and for him in the long run. "[Joe] did a switcheroo, and, needless to say, I wasn't in that con- versation in regards to that switcheroo," he laughed. "I found out that first game that the game plan had changed consid- erably. So, you could either get on board and go with it or you could sit there and pout. and wallow in the self-pity. I chose to get on board. It was a tough pill to swallow. It was kind of a tale of two sea- sons. The game plan changed. You've got to adjust, and I did. Then, about midway through the season, I started to run the football again. And, overall, I think it was a chief factor in us winning the national championship due to the fact that we had an offense that could run and throw the football." Not only did the Lions win the na- tional title by beat- ing Georgia, 24-20, in the Sugar Bowl, but Warner also repeated as a first-team All- American and was inducted into the Col- lege Football Hall of Fame in 2009. Thirty-five years after wrapping up his career, Warner still is the second-leading rusher in school history (3,338 yards and 24 touchdowns on 649 carries), and his 662 receiving yards rank third all-time among Penn State running backs. Georgia's Herschel Walker won the Heisman Trophy, but as with Allen in the Fiesta Bowl a year earlier, Warner out- played him, thanks in large part to the Nittany Lion defense. Warner finished 10th in the Heisman voting, with Black- ledge sixth, and he still thinks he might have had a chance to beat out Walker if the offense had not changed. "It would have been closer, I can assure you of that," Warner said, "but we still won the big prize, the national championship, and I take satisfaction in that." Blackledge agreed. He said they never talked about the Heisman Trophy during the season. "We knew the fact that we were both getting attention meant that we were pretty good offensively," Black- ledge said. "And the longer our season went and the more our offensive line de- veloped, the more difficult we became to defend. That's why at the end of the year we were as good of an offense as college football had seen in a long, long time." Warner also believes what happened in 1982 benefited his eight-year professional career, most of which he spent in Seattle as the Seahawks' featured running back after being the third overall choice in the 1983 NFL Draft and winning AFC Rookie of the Year honors from the UPI in his debut sea- son. "It was win-win for the team and me," P E N N S T A T E F O O T B A L L >> HISTORY MAKERS Warner (above) and Blackledge teamed up in 1982 to lead the Nittany Lions to their first national championship. BWI file photos