Five Quick Thoughts: Illinois
Rock fights are ugly.
Penn State knocked off No. 19 Illinois on Saturday night in the kind of game you never really thought the Nittany Lions were going to lose but also always felt like they were one mistake away from accidentally losing. Penn State’s offense racked up 239 yards on the ground while Drew Allar completed 71% of his passes.
The defense was a mixed bag, but giving up seven points is hard to ignore in today’s era of football. This game falls pretty squarely in the category of “ugly wins,” but Penn State will take wins however it can get them. Here are five quick thoughts.
Penalties: A lot of issues that football teams have often circle back to solutions that aren’t very straightforward. It was easy to see that Penn State’s offense had issues in 2023, but how you might have gone about fixing those issues wasn’t undeniably obvious.
In 2024, Penn State’s penalty problems are not only fairly unique under James Franklin but also fairly preventable. It would be one thing if Penn State was getting flagged for Joey Porter Jr DPI calls that were a product of his style of play, but it’s something else entirely when it comes back to things like staying on the right side of the line of scrimmage. A needless block in the back took a touchdown off the board only adding insult to injury.
These things might not matter against worse teams on the schedule, but Penn State will lose to better teams like USC if the Trojans are backed up and then suddenly gifted five yards here or there. Penn State has now been called offside on eight occasions. These sorts of mistakes will lose you a game as much as anything else will.
Penn State’s penalty ranking the past four seasons has been above average, finishing: 30th, 44th, 44th and 9th.
Kicking: This observation isn’t exactly splitting the atom, but Penn State has a problem when it comes to field goal kicking. This overall issue was something you could predict coming into the season, but it seems almost impossible to imagine that Sander Sahaydak is going to get another real shot at a meaningful field goal in the immediate future. For a guy who came to Penn State with a reputable profile it’s a weird thing to see him struggle so much. Then again, kicking in high school ain’t kicking in Beaver Stadium. And if Simone Biles can get lost in her own head and back out of Olympics, a random college kicker sure can too. Kicking keeps you in games, missing kicks loses you games.
Ground and Pound: There has always been a theory that the best way for Penn State to beat the teams like Michigan and Ohio State isn’t so much to get into a shootout with them but to get into a physical time-eating ground war. This rings even more true when you consider that Michigan just won a national title mostly doing this. The physical running of Kaytron Allen and Nick Singleton speaks to Penn State’s ability to punch teams in the mouth over and over again and to a strength it could lean on in ways it hasn’t been able to in recent years. It would be one thing too if these were finesse runs, but both of these guys were bowling people over.
This kind of running will win you a lot of games. Singleton was six yards from Penn State having two, 100-yard rushers.
Tyler Warren Show: Maybe it’s what he’s getting in return for opting not to declare for the NFL Draft, but Tyler Warren is getting the ball in just about every situation possible. It says a bit about Warren’s ability - and how lukewarm the Beau Pribula package has gotten - that they basically swapped roles on Saturday night. Warren is getting a push for the Mackey Award [given to the nation’s top tight end] and it’s not even a veiled attempt anymore.
Defensive Stuff: It’s hard to watch Penn State’s defense and have the sort of feeling that makes you go “yes, this group will be the reason Penn State finally beats Ohio State.” but then you look at the box score and Illinois basically did nothing in the second half, made it just past 200 yards of total offense, turned the ball over twice and gave up 13 tackles for a loss. Ohio State et al will make Penn State pay for the missed tackles and issues it had in the first half, but this unit was the perfect example of“bend but don’t break.”
Between injuries and a somewhat undeniable drop-off in talent compared to last season there will be problems to solve for the rest of the year, but cleaning up tackling and penalties would be an easy start to some overarching issues. Overall this group is going to continue to be a work in progress, the immediate question will be if the Nittany Lions can pull themselves together enough in two weeks to slow down USC.