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Penn State playing for missing Mahon

PISCATAWAY, N.J. &#8212; More than 20 years later, the motivational ploy still stuck in James Franklin&#8217;s head.His college coach at East Stroudsburg, Denny Douds, presented a sign to his players.&#8220;I remember as a freshman there, him putting it up,&#8221; the Penn State coach said during an ESPN segment that ran Saturday morning. &#8220;It was &#8216;Opportunityisnowhere.&#8217; And when you read that, some people will read it as &#8216;Opportunity is nowhere.&#8217; Some people will read it as &#8216;Opportunity is now here.&#8217;&#8220;In life, big moments like that &#8212; the Ohio State night and what&#8217;s going on this year and this season &#8212; don&#8217;t come around all the time. I&#8217;ve been coaching 22 years, haven&#8217;t been a part of many of these. So when these opportunities come, you have to take advantage of it.&#8221;That&#8217;s exactly where Penn State is after Saturday night&#8217;s 39-0 win at Rutgers, the team&#8217;s seventh straight. With one game left in the regular season, the Nittany Lions can stake their claim for a New Year&#8217;s Six bowl game by beating Michigan State next week at Beaver Stadium.And if Ohio State takes down Michigan, the Lions will have a shot at a Big Ten title, with an eye at a College Football Playoff berth.&#8220;It&#8217;s surreal,&#8221; said fifth-year senior defensive end Evan Schwan, who arrived on campus a few weeks before NCAA sanctions slammed the program in 2012. &#8220;I never thought as a freshman that we&#8217;d be in the position we are now.&#8220;I&#8217;m very proud of everyone on the team, the fans and staff for sticking with us and working through the tough times.&#8221;They did what they had to do against the miserable Scarlet Knights, who were shut out for the fourth time this season. Their combined score against Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan and Michigan State was 224-0.The Knights finished with 87 yards of offense, the lowest total ever by a Big Ten opponent in the Lions&#8217; 24 seasons in the conference. Penn State had 549.&#8220;Right now, we&#8217;re not even one-dimensional,&#8221; sighed first-year Knights coach Chris Ash, who won a national title two years ago as Ohio State&#8217;s defensive coordinator. &#8220;You look at the stats and there&#8217;s not much going well.&#8221;No indeed. Rutgers managed just five first downs the entire game and had 21 yards of total offense after halftime, even after backups checked in on both sides to close out the game.If it seems like Rutgers is a mile behind the top teams in the Big Ten East, that&#8217;s because it&#8217;s true.In those four shutout losses within the division, the Knights were outgained 2,258 yards &#8212; or 1.3 miles &#8212; to 382.With that in mind, despite Penn State (9-2, 7-1 Big Ten) leading just 9-0 at halftime, the gulf seemed much larger.&#8220;I felt pretty good,&#8221; said Franklin, whose team was tied at the break in its last two road trips to Purdue and Indiana. &#8220;I don&#8217;t really want to go into the locker room and say we&#8217;re a second-half team. But in times like this, it&#8217;s nice to go in and say we&#8217;re a second-half team. Guys responded well.&#8221;Juwan Johnson broke things open at the start of the second half, coming untouched to block a punt that set up a Saquon Barkley touchdown.&#8220;It was a spark,&#8221; said Johnson, a redshirt freshman receiver who hails from New Jersey. &#8220;We kept our heads up and kept going. The team came back to life after that, so it was definitely part of our success.&#8221;The lone moment of distress for the Lions came later in the third when Barkley took a hit to the back of the head and appeared to briefly be undergoing concussion testing on the sideline.Penn State scored a few plays later to make it 25-0 and Barkley was held out the rest of the game for precautionary measures.&#8220;Yeah, Saquon&#8217;s fine,&#8221; Franklin said, adding later that he could&#8217;ve gone back into the game if needed.The Lions took the cautious route with a handful of players, including Lake-Lehman&#8217;s Connor McGovern. The true freshman guard was cleared to play, according to Franklin, after leaving last week&#8217;s game at Indiana in the fourth quarter. But although the team&#8217;s starting right guard was on the trip and in uniform, he didn&#8217;t have a full week of practice and spent the night on the sideline.&#8220;We could have played him tonight,&#8221; Franklin said. &#8220;But I just felt like if we could get by without playing him, we&#8217;d like to do that. We&#8217;re always going to put our players&#8217; safety first.&#8220;If we could just give him another few days to get ready so that he&#8217;s at full strength next week &#8230; with a young player like that, we can make sure he gets all the reps in practice so he can go out and play confident.&#8221;The game was anything but pretty early on.Penn State opened the game with freshman Miles Sanders fumbling away the kickoff, needing the defense to bail them out and force a missed field goal. Rutgers was gifted the ball at the 19, but senior safety Malik Golden sniffed out a reverse by the Knights (2-9, 0-8) on their first play and dropped tailback Justin Goodwin for a loss of seven.&#8220;We knew they&#8217;d come with some type of reverse or trick play-type thing,&#8221; senior linebacker Brandon Bell said. &#8220;Probably wasn&#8217;t expecting it that soon. But we were ready, and Malik made a great play.&#8221;It was the only play Rutgers ran in the red zone all night. After missing the field goal to end the drive, the Knights never crossed Penn State&#8217;s 40-yard line and only broke midfield once after halftime.Penn State&#8217;s offense, very efficient in the red zone over the past three weeks, had an awful start on Saturday.On four trips inside the 20 in the first half, the Lions came away with just three Tyler Davis field goals. They had the excuse of a brutal headlong wind in the first quarter &#8212; one that was actually blowing the net behind the goalposts forward through the uprights as Davis was lining up.&#8220;You definitely have to take (the wind) into account,&#8221; said Davis, who set a new career-high with four field goals, one off the Penn State single-game record. &#8220;I never try to aim outside the post no matter what. I&#8217;ll aim a little bit inside each post. The best thing you can do is go out there before the game and try to gauge the wind, but it wasn&#8217;t very windy before the game. When I got out there, I just kind of felt it and aimed inside the post.&#8221;As for Rutgers? Well, the Knights managed to break an all-time Big Ten record on Saturday night. Michael Cintron punted 11 times to give him 89 kicks on the year, more than any other player in conference history in a single season.<style>
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<div class="neCaption">Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley tries to get away from Rutgers linebacker Deonte Roberts during the first half of Saturday&#8217;s game in Piscataway, N.J. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_McSorley-Rutgers-8.jpg</photo0><caption0>Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley tries to get away from Rutgers linebacker Deonte Roberts during the first half of Saturday&#8217;s game in Piscataway, N.J. </caption0><photoCredit0>Mel Evans | AP photo </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_AP163251809323852016112042430229-6.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Penn State quarterback Tommy Stevens, second from right, celebrates with his teammates after scoring a touchdown during the second half of an NCAA college football game against Rutgers on Saturday, Nov. 19, 2016, in Piscataway, N.J. Penn State won 39-0. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)</div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/web1_AP163251809323852016112042430229-6.jpg</photo1><caption1>Penn State quarterback Tommy Stevens, second from right, celebrates with his teammates after scoring a touchdown during the second half of an NCAA college football game against Rutgers on Saturday, Nov. 19, 2016, in Piscataway, N.J. Penn State won 39-0. (AP Photo/Mel Evans)</caption1><photoCredit1>Mel Evans | AP photo </photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta>By Derek Levarsedlevarse@www.timesleader.com</bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta>No. 8 Penn State 39, Rutgers 0Penn State 6 3 16 14 &#8212; 39Rutgers 0 0 0 0 &#8212; 0First QuarterPSU &#8212; Tyler Davis 32 field goal, 6:34PSU &#8212; Davis 34 field goal, 0:20Second QuarterPSU &#8212; Davis 40 field goal, 5:28Third QuarterPSU &#8212; Saquon Barkley 1 run (Davis kick), 12:33PSU &#8212; Davis 32 field goal, 6:34PSU &#8212; Andre Robinson 2 run (pass failed), 3:32Fourth QuarterPSU &#8212; Mark Allen 27 pass from Trace McSorley (Davis kick), 7:59PSU &#8212; Tommy Stevens 12 run (Davis kick), 4:07Team stats PSU RUFirst downs 25 5Rushes-yards 49-339 33-39Passing 210 48Comp-Att-Int 17-33-0 7-17-0Return Yards 32 111Punts-Avg. 3-43.0 11-35.4Fumbles-Lost 1-1 3-0Penalties-Yards 3-15 6-50Time of Possession 35:13 24:47INDIVIDUAL STATISTICSRUSHING &#8212; PSU, Saquon Barkley 16-92, Miles Sanders 5-85, Tommy Stevens 6-61, Trace McSorley 11-55, Mark Allen 5-26, Andre Robinson 6-20. RU, Justin Goodwin 10-20, Tylin Oden 7-19, Giovanni Rescigno 9-10, Robert Martin 2-5, Dacoven Bailey 1-2, TEAM 2-(minus 8), Josh Hicks 2-(minus 9).PASSING &#8212; PSU, McSorley 17-33-0-210. RU, Rescigno 7-16-0-48, Oden 0-1-0-0.RECEIVING &#8212; PSU, Mike Gesicki 5-47, DeAndre Thompkins 4-40, Chris Godwin 3-36, DaeSean Hamilton 2-35, Barkley 2-25, Allen 1-27. RU, Andre Patton 4-29, Jawuan Harris 1-19, John Tsimis 1-3, Goodwin 1-(minus 3).MISSED FIELD GOALS &#8212; Rutgers, David Bonagura 45.A &#8212; 51,366.</factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta>Reach Derek Levarse at 570-991-6396 or on Twitter @TLdlevarse</shirttailMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><videoMeta><table style="border:none;width:98%;" class="mceItemTable"><tbody><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">VideoID:</td><td id="videoid" style="width:50em;font-size:90%;"> YIQVjjIF4Wc</td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">VideoType:</td><td id="videotype" style="font-size:90%;"> YOUTUBE</td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">URL:</td><td id="url" style="font-size:90%;"> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIQVjjIF4Wc</td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">Video Embed String:</td><td id="videoembedstring" style="font-size:90%;"> </td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">Video Caption:</td><td id="videocaption" style="font-size:90%;"> </td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">Video Credit:</td><td id="videocredit" style="font-size:90%;"> Derek Levarse | Times Leader</td></tr><tr><td style="font-weight:bold;font-size:100%;vertical-align:top;text-align:right;border:none;">Video Position:</td><td id="videoposition" style="font-size:90%;"> </td></tr></tbody></table>(use the &#8220;for files&#8230;&#8221; link above to associate attached files with this source)</videoMeta></div>

Penn State blanks woeful Rutgers, eyes shot at Big Ten title