Embarrassing Game

Penn State was absolutely dominated by Notre Dame today. What a shame too. This was the first matchup in 14 years between the two powerhouse college football programs and Penn State forgot to show up for it. Coming into the game I really felt like Penn State could compete with Notre Dame and possibly even leave South Bend with a victory. Boy was I wrong, and thankfully I did pick Notre Dame in my College Pick'Em league. Let's break it down...

First and foremost, Notre Dame did an excellent job at tiring out Penn State's best player on defense, Paul Posluszny. With the endless amount of dumpoffs to the TE's, as well as a few more to WR's and RB's, it seemed like Posluszny was running all over the place trying to make tackles. By attacking Penn State's defense at the heart with a strong passing game, Penn State could never put pressure on Brady Quinn. When a prolific passer has all the time in the world...game over.

A corollary to Notre Dame's strong passing game was the incredibly weak secondary of Penn State. I have never seen so many wide open receivers in my life. Seriously, what were the DB's on Penn State doing out there? Penn State's pass coverage was wretched today, enough said.

As for Penn State's offense, there were two glaring problems. QB Anthony Morelli, albeit talent, looked very inexperienced and can not be counted on in a big game. Secondly, the Penn State offensive line was manhandled at times today. On several occasions, Notre Dame's defensive line was able to blow past the Penn State O-line to get to the quarterback. With Notre Dame's offense firing on all cylinders, Notre Dame's defense could focus solely on the Penn State passing game as it quickly became too far out-of-hand to run the ball often.

So what was good about Penn State today? Tony Hunt looked great again...until the Nittany Lions had to focus exclusively on passing. Also, Penn St. really did move the ball well throughout much of the first half, they just made too many mistakes (missed field goal attempts, turnovers, etc.). Giving a top-5 team extra opportunities is a huge mistake. Had they gone into the half trailing 13-6 rather than 20-0, perhaps things would have been different, one can only speculate though.

Clearly Notre Dame is a legitimate contender for the national championship, provided this is the true Fighting Irish, and not the team that played Georgia Tech last week. As for Penn State, I thought they were a top-15 team before this game. Now I would have to rank them near the bottom of the top-25. They play Youngstown St. next week so they have a golden opportunity to bounce back and show what they are truly capable of doing. They had better do so too, as they play at #1 Ohio State in two weeks. Hopefully the Nittany Lions can turn it around in a hurry.