Blue White Illustrated

postgame media scrum thought he was saying, McGloin said, simply, "Write what you think." What a lot of people in the Penn State camp seemed to think following the game was that the video replay booth botched the call, which would have given the Nittany Lions a 30-27 lead with 7:39 to play. Bill O'Brien said Penn State's coaches in the booth "felt like it was over the goal line." Players, who watched the stadium's video replay screens and later re- ceived texts from outraged parents and friends, felt that way, too. But O'Brien said the officials told him on the sideline that the replay booth didn't have enough evidence to reverse the call. And Lehman's end zone dive turned out to be the last se- rious scoring opportunity Penn State got. The Lions' next two drives fizzled, leaving the team with a 6-4 record and a 4-2 mark in the Big Ten. The ruling on Lehman's dive wasn't the only subject of conversation in the visitor's media room. As O'Brien was quick to note, much of the harm that befell the Nittany Lions against the 16th-ranked Cornhuskers was self- inflicted. They fumbled twice inside Nebraska's 10-yard line: once in the first quarter when tailback Zach Zwinak was hit from behind, and again when Lehman lost control on the goal line. Those turnovers were more than a little costly. "They kill you," O'Brien said. "You can't turn the ball over. And these are good kids. Zach's twisting, trying to gain extra yards – I think he gained 8 yards on the play – and Matt Lehman was just trying to make a play. But you've gotta come away with scores there when you're playing Nebraska, which is gonna score some points. That was not good on our part." Penn State got a big game from Zwinak, who finished with 141 yards on 21 carries, including a 50-yard touchdown in the first quarter. Mc- Gloin added 240 passing yards, and his effective passing in blustery field conditions helped stake Penn State to a 20-6 halftime lead. But Nebraska scored two touch- downs in the first six minutes of the second half, overcoming a 20-6 Penn State halftime advantage. And after allowing the Lions to retake the lead SCORING SUMMARY 1ST 13:14 6:17 2ND 12:29 6:58 2:42 1:08 3RD 11:48 9:37 6:01 4TH 10:57 5:02 0:23 PSU NEB NEB PSU PSU PSU NEB NEB PSU NEB NEB NEB Zwinak, Zach 50-yard run (Ficken, Sam kick) 4 plays, 74 yards, TOP 1:46........................................................................7-0 Maher, Brett 32-yard field goal 15 plays, 51 yards, TOP 6:50......................................................................7-3 Maher, Brett 27-yard field goal 12 plays, 84 yards, TOP 4:05......................................................................7-6 Ficken, Sam 27-yard field goal 7 plays, 26 yards, TOP 2:43......................................................................10-6 James, Jesse 10-yard pass from McGloin, Matt (Ficken, Sam kick) 5 plays, 31 yards, TOP 2:05......................................................................17-6 Ficken, Sam 38-yard field goal 6 plays, 35 yards, TOP 1:12......................................................................20-6 Cross, Imani 1-yard run (Maher, Brett kick) 8 plays, 75 yards, TOP 3:12....................................................................20-13 Cross, Imani 2-yard run (Maher, Brett kick) 2 plays, 4 yards, TOP 0:45......................................................................20-20 Ficken, Sam 35-yard field goal 13 plays, 57 yards, TOP 3:36..................................................................23-20 Turner, Jamal 5-yard pass from Martinez, Taylor (Maher, Brett kick) 6 plays, 71 yards, TOP 3:10....................................................................23-27 Meredith, Cameron safety.......................................................................23-29 Maher, Brett 33-yard field goal 4 plays, 9 yards, TOP 2:16......................................................................23-32 on a 35-yard Sam Ficken field goal – his third field goal of the day – the Cornhuskers took the lead for good, 27-23, on a 5-yard pass from Taylor Martinez to Jamal Turner. The Huskers (8-2, 5-1) have made a habit of this. They trailed by double- digits in the second half of three of their previous Big Ten games, rallying for victories over Wisconsin, North- western and Michigan State. On Saturday, their surge was made possible by a ground game that gouged PSU for 267 rushing yards. Senior defensive tackle Jordan Hill played for the Lions after a week of uncertainty following his knee injury at Purdue. He came in at the start of the second quarter, but it wasn't enough. Martinez and Ameer Abdul- lah combined for 249 rushing yards. The Huskers' success on the ground helped explain why some players weren't much interested in talking about the controversial touch- N O V E M B E R 1 0 , 2 0 1 2 2 down call. "We put ourselves in that situation," cornerback Stephon Mor- ris said. "We could have gotten some more third-down stops. We could have stopped Martinez, and we could have stopped the run. You can't leave the game in the referees' hands, and we know that." The Lions will have a chance to re- group Saturday at home against Indi- ana. The Hoosiers are in the midst of another difficult trudge through the Big Ten. They lost to Wisconsin, 62- 14, at home on Saturday, surrender- ing 605 yards of total offense. O'Brien said he expects his players to re- bound, just as they did following losses to Virginia and Ohio State ear- lier this season. "We have a bunch of great kids," he said. "I just feel terrible that we lost this game. But we lost to a great foot- ball team, a very well-coached football team. We've got to get back to work on Monday." B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . c O M

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