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NEWS & NOTES FOOTBALL PSU embraces Big Ten expansion After spending nearly 20 years alone, Penn State finally has some company on the Big Ten's eastern frontier. The addition of Maryland and Rutgers in November caught many by surprise, but the sudden flurry of expansion activity was greeted with enthusiasm in University Park. With the addition of the Terrapins and Scarlet Knights to the league – a move predicated largely on the desire for additional cable TV revenue – Penn State not only will get to play some of its road games closer to home, but also will have an opportunity to rekindle a couple of old rivalries – both on the field and on the recruiting front, too; currently, 15 Nittany Lion players hail from New Jersey, while another 14 are from Maryland. "For many years, Penn State was the East Coast team, but now we're starting to get the Atlantic corridor," coach Bill O'Brien said. "They are two great schools with great football traditions. It's going to be fun to play and recruit against them." To date, Penn State has had the upper hand against both of those programs. It has met them a combined 61 times and has lost only three times: twice to Rutgers (26-3 in 1918 and 21-16 in 1988) and once to Maryland (21-17 in 1961). The Terps also fought Penn State to a 13-13 tie in 1989. Playing in the Atlantic Coast Conference, Maryland struggled in 2012, finishing with a 4-8 record while fielding one of the worst offenses in the country. Rutgers, meanwhile, finished as Big East co-champion, going 9-3 overall and qualifying for a spot in the Russell Athletic Bowl against Virginia Tech. Both programs have promising young talent that should be on full display when they begin Big Ten play in 2014. Rutgers finished with the No. 24 recruiting class in the country a year ago, as ranked by Rivals.com. The only Big Ten teams that were ranked higher were Ohio State and Michigan. Maryland's 2012 recruiting class finished No. 35 in the country. Headlined by five-star wide receiver Stefon Diggs, the Terps' class would have been fifth-best in the Big Ten. The additions give the league a stronger East Coast presence and extend the Big Ten Network's footprint into two of the nation's largest television markets: New York and Washington, D.C. Growing the league's profile in major population centers was no small consideration. "I would say the driving force is demographics," commissioner Jim Delany said. "But when you look at it, you can't help but think that this is good for Penn State, as well." The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that Wisconsin athletic director Barry Alvarez told his school's athletic board that the additions stemmed from concerns that Penn State might be tempted to explore its options. "Jim felt that someday, if we didn't have anyone else in that corridor, someday it wouldn't make sense maybe for Penn State to be in our league, that they would go into a league somewhere on the East Coast," Alvarez said, according to the Journal Sentinel. "By [expanding], it keeps us in the Northeast corridor." It's certainly good for those Penn State alumni who like to attend road games. Roger Williams, executive director of the Penn State Alumni Association, told the Centre Daily Times that more than 25,000 alumni live in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, and another 8,000 live in the Baltimore area. More than 50,000 alumni live in New Jersey and New York City. "Some of the buzz out there from our standpoint and from the standpoint of an alumni relationship director is that I think people are very interested in re-instituting some of the rivalries with teams that we used to play," Williams told the CDT. "It's an

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