they almost kicked me out of Game On at Caesar’s Pier in Atlantic City for yelling “SUSTAIN THAT BLOCK, SUSTAIN THAT BLOCK”. D-Will had alot of space in front of him. For someone built like a tight end, you have to hold that block for at least a couple of seconds

…that I wish there was a “none of the above” option on that poll?

I’ll have the defensive grades up tonight, by the way.

Was I the only one who wasn’t worried about the fact that our starting QB was pulled? I’ve been a supporter of Clark since mid summer and I’m thrilled to see the success he’s been having, but putting Devlin in during the 4th quarter didn’t cause any worry. I was still worried about what the outcome of the game would be, but certainly not because of who was taking snaps.

I LOVE knowing that our backup is better than many (most?) teams’ starting QBs.

I don’t blame him for this, but we have gotten accustomed to expecting results you would see from a 4 year starter. I cannot imagine that Joe would pull Clark for his game play, this is the same staff that gave us 2 years of Morelli when it would have been better to direct snap to the RB half the time.
So is the final verdict on the amount of pressure Clark was under from bad running back blocks or the Oline, it seems someone has to take the blame. Or maybe it was the coaches, in which case D is appropriate.

I thought Clark played pretty well, aside from a few balls that sailed on him. Really, that was the first time he’s seen any significant pressure all season. However, he still managed the game well and single-handedly kept a few drives going. The playcalling was not real creative. And, as good as Rosyter played in the 4th quarer, he looked a little tentative earlier and seemed to make a few bad cuts or poor reads on blocks.

Regardless of the reason for Clark being pulled, I have said to coworkers that ever since the beginning of the season that a situation where moving the ball in a close game, against a tough opponent, would be a challenget would be the ideal time to bring in Devlin. Not for any reason other than to throw a wrinkle at the opposing D. Something different than what they have been seeing up to that point in the game.

Because the rest of the offense seemed to worry one bit that their leader had been replaced showed me the confidence that they have in their backup QB, the respect he commands and the poise that he has. That got Devlin my MVP vote.

I agree that I didn’t like seeing Clark’s initial reaction. I would expect him to show the same confidence in his backup that the rest of his teammates were showing. I was glad to see him shake that and get into his unfamiliar role as cheerleader. I agree with the earlier comment about his initial reaction could also be a sign of his competitiveness and I’m not going to fault anyone for competiveness, but leaders still handle themselves better in those siuations.

One last point (because I will ramble on all day if I don’t stop soon). I have mixed feeling about how I would overall evaluate Clark’s performance. The O-line was not giving him the type of protection that he had been accustomed too. I think there’s something to the argument that he didn’t handle it well, but I also believe that there certainly have to be some plays in the playbook that could have kept that pass rush honest. Designed rollouts to give Clark more time to throw (on the run), some options, more play action and/or screens. I think his coaches could have done a little more to help him handle that situation, but like everyone else here, it’s tough to bitch about the end result.

I agree Clark is competitive and that’s good. But what good comes from sulking on the sideline? At one point I saw Jared Odrick trying to console him and calm him down. Instead of talking to the coaches and teammates about making adjustments and preparing for the upcoming biggest defensive stand of the season he’s bring the starting quarterback down from the ledge. How can anyone not say this was an uneccessary distraction?

Clark needs to be a man and accept the decision of the coaches and medical staff. When your teammates are on the field you put your ego aside and cheer them on.

At the end of the game. Look at his face, he definitely had a concussion. Plus that guy holding his waist was with him all the way into the tunnel, they didn’t want him to talk to anyone because he probably would have said something like a drunk person would have like “woooooooo we won f*ckers, eat sh*t buckeyes”

http://assets.espn.go.com/media/apphoto/da2bbb1e-a590-4b18-a0b6-ab1b84ab09af.jpg

On ESPN.com: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/columns/story?columnist=maisel_ivan&id=3664559

What I found most interesting was this:

That’s why, with the score 3-3 at the half, Penn State came out and ran the ball right at Ohio State. On six of seven plays, the Nittany Lions ran the ball, and five of those six plays went between the tackles. The drive fizzled just past midfield, but Penn State made its point. “We wanted to wear them down,” assistant coach Jay Paterno said. “We knew we weren’t going to go out in the second half and score a lot of points.”

The plan didn’t exactly wow the boss. After the drive, Joe Paterno turned to his son and said, “For crying out loud, would you open it up?”

Random thoughts:
Clark / receivers were slow on their blitz reads. It is hard to tell on TV but it seemed that we just were not getting to the vacated zones left open when OSU Blitzed. Other than that, I thought Clark played very well.
Devlin looked brilliant. He only had one throw but it was a TD if they did not grab the receiver. His reads are just a few split seconds faster than Clark’s. His passing is crisper also. I am not sure he has Clark’s tenacity at this time. I thought we made the wrong call on 3rd down and 5 on our last field goal drive. I was waiting to see Devlin fake the handoff to Royster and bootleg around the corner for a first down to end the game.
Penn State played nearly a mistake free game. Look at what our punter did…
I expected us to destroy them with our offense. Our D play far exceeded my expectations.
I hate to complain about the refs but they were pathetic. I can think of 2 late hits on the first two plays of the game, holding ALLLLL NIGHT LONG, a running into the kicker call, a push in the back. With the exception of one of the late hits on the first plays from scrimmage all these were easy calls but were not made. I heard some comments about the ball spots being poor also but I did not notice that. I would be the first to admit that we get our fair share of calls in most games but it is amazing how we always come out on the short side when we play Mich and OSU!

I’m hearing a lot of praise for the way Devlin handled himself. I’ll admit it’s great he didn’t crap his pants or anything, but what did he do that was so impressive? He just handed the ball off to Royster and rode Shipley’s back on a few QB sneaks. His one pass drew a pass interference call, but it looked overthrown and behind Williams to me.

So just throwing this out to the group. What was so great about Devlin?

Rubin for bailing their asses out.

Did anyone see the foxsports.com power rankings? Absolutely a bunch of scumbags.

http://msn.foxsports.com/cfb/powerRankings

I have to scratch my head at PSU dropping three spots for a win over OSU in Columbus while Florida moves up three spots for a win over Kentucky. Oklahoma State loses and they don’t drop any? Oklahoma gives up 28 points IN THE FIRST HALF and moves up?

I was also disappointed how Clark handled not coming back into the game. I don’t want to use the term benched because a medical reason is not a benching. Clark did seem to come to grips with not coming back in and did cheer the team on. I just hopes he understands this a team effort not a group of individuals.