This year’s defense (w/ Bowman and Lee) is better than last years.

We are weaker at DE, but much stronger everywhere else.

What is everyone’s elses thoughts?

Anyway, in my opinion, this team misses Shipley a lot more than I expected. Clark is still doing the same thing he did when they had to settle for a field goal against Wisconsin – putting too much pressure on himself.

I really don’t think they were being overly conservative-there were a surprising number of passes that would have been ugly off-tackle runs or QB draw plays in the past. I think they had the right intentions, and they were flinging it all over the field in the second half, but Clark was throwing passes under pressure and they couldn’t create anything from their runs. After Clark got drilled and got up slowly in the third, he started throwing into triple coverage and it was all over.

Still, I think this is more of a case of Iowa being very good than PSU being very bad. Fortunately I think Ohio State is the only real defensive challenge left on the schedule, barring Michigan State or Northwestern living up to their preseason expectations. I think this team can go 10-2. Another positive, the WR’s looked very good against one of the best secondaries in the country.

You watch him out there and he looks lost. He wiffs on a lot of blocks, something that we weren’t used to seeing out of him. At one point in the game the other day (forget which play specifically but it could’ve been many), I remember seeing 3 PSU lineman standing around while Clark was running for his life.

move him back to RG….give someone else a shot a center. Put Landolt back at RT…Have a least one experienced side of the OL.

but that’s not bad at all IMO. We all knew our OL would probably hurt us at some point against a good opponent which Iowa is but we also all knew that we would probably beat up on the other teams. I think this season is still going as planned with 10 or 11 wins. OSU will probably be the only other team that will make us pay for our OL.

i don’t feel like creating my own fan post

this sucks

i blame the weather

i blame my wife (not a PSU’er) for leaving at halftime with her friend

i blame my brother for having to work the next day and not being able to put in a full effort

i blame Iowa (for everything)

I don’t pore over boxscores and watch the game on DVR, but just going off of memory alone….I recall two pass attempts over 15 yards, something like 2 for 2 and about 110 yards.

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

but were they the types who can improve as we think they are now?

Back when we had offensive line issues in 2006 and 2007 we had Tony Hunt. Hunt would pound the ball and get 25 carries a game. He probably averaged 3.5 yards per carry, but he still moved the chains. Late in a close game, he would wear down the defensive front and often he was the difference in those games.

My question is, with all the switching between Royster and Green, are we missing that consistency at RB that allows us to wear down the defense?

in key moments historically. This team got timid and hesistant. The series that resulted in the saftey was mindboggling. What was the philosophy on that drive? Mount a real drive or get enough room to punt? The first play is a wide run to right seemingly trying to catch Iowa playing a middle run. The next play is a fb dive. Then the fumble play where Clark doesn’t feel the pressure, but the routes seemed to take forever to develop. You could feel the safety coming from the moment the ball was snapped. My rambling point is either stay aggresive and try to mount a drive or run it up the middle three times and punt, but don’t change play to play.

So PSU lost.

Offense went into a shell and defense tucked into a neat cover 3? Sounds awfully familiar.

What do we do about the O-line? Is it even a remote possibility that we scrap the Wiz-at-center experiment and switch him back to RG? Is it a foregone conclusion that we’d get worse at center if that were to occur? Have we ever made that kind of adjustment mid-season?

Uh, I think a group of collegiate athletes should do the same.

Would be interested to see what he can do w/ PSU, OSU, UM, type talent/facilties

Yes there are glaring problems on offense and special teams but we really don’t know how bad due to the weather. I agree with RUTS that this week is a crictical game. How a team responds from a loss is important. If they play with a chip on their shoulder and improve, the schedule still lends itself to a decent record. IF they sulk and play like crap….it could be a long road a head. On the positive, we still have a hell of a defense ( yeah it was not the DL’s best game, but the wet field negated a good bit of our speed rush) and if they can keep us in games while the offesne improves, we will be alright.

“As State fell apart in the fourth quarter, giving up three more turnovers, the outcome confirmed the concerns we had when the Lions got complacent and couldn’t score in the second half against Akron, after building up a 31-0 first-half lead. It validated the worries we had about our rushing attack when Syracuse held us to an average of just 2.2 yards on 35 carries, even though our passing attack carried us to a 28-7 victory.”

Check out the link for more: http://www.imakenews.com/footballletter/index000392713.cfm
FYI: If you don’t read these, they provide a decent game (and weather, tailgate, blueband, fans) summary, pics, stats, etc. Also, I think John Black has been writing these since Joe became coach (imagine how old this guy is!), so he often references previous games/seasons. I recommend you check ’em out.