PSU Nittany Lions dominate Maryland Terps on Senior day, 38-3

State College – On Senior Day in Happy (Icy, Cold, Wet) Valley, Senior QB Trace McSorely scored two first quarter TDs to take an early lead while the Lion defense dominated the Terps for the second year in a row for a 38-3 victory.  Last season in the season finale at College Park, PSU triumphed, 66-3. After losing in OT last week to Ohio State, 52-51, the Terp offense displayed no such effectiveness against the improving Lion defense.

Honoring the past and hopes for the future

On a cold, rainy day with an icy mix thrown down early in the day, the Penn State crowd in half full Beaver Stadium celebrated the final performances of 21 seniors.  However, the crowd watched the Lions not only outperform the Terps with outgoing seniors, but they also watched promising underclassmen boding well for the future of Penn State football.  First-time Guest Game Analyst Kevin Rogers (Manhattan College Jasper), a long-time PSU football fan who had not seen a game at Beaver Stadium since it was half the size of what it is today, enjoyed what he saw despite the elements he drove through and sat in.  He plans to definitely return to Beaver Stadium again in the near future.

Bing, bing, bing!

The No. 12 Nittany Lions (9-3, 6-3) followed the opening kickoff with just three plays that put them into the end zone.  McSorely (12 for 22 passing, 230 yards, 1 TD; 11 carries for 64 yards, 2 TDS) completed his first pass on the first play to Frosh KJ Hamler for 34 yards.  Miles Sanders (14 carries for 128 yards) advanced the next play 35 yards on his first run before McSorely ran it in for a 10-yard TD.

Later in the period, Terp PK Joe Petrino put Maryland on the scoreboard with his 26-yard FG already matching the total point his team scored against PSU the previous season.  The Lions came right back as McSorely carried the ball over again for his second score in the first from the 20-yard line.  The Lions led 14-3 at the end of the first and never looked back as the Terp offense could not break through the tough Nittany Lion defense who stopped UMD 15 times this day behind the line of scrimmage. DE Yetur Gross Matos led with 3.5 TFLs. Keith Givens added two sacks.

What’s wrong with this picture?

Only Jake Pinegar’s 25-yard FG added three points in the second to increase the Penn State lead.  Kevin noted a particular PSU weakness, however, along the way.  Punt returner DeAndre Thompkins avoided fielding any punts even if evidently catchable. By not fielding any by signaling fair catch, he constantly put the Lions in worse field position than they could have had giving up five to ten yards at least each time.  PSU started drives from the 14, 6, and 15 yard-line because of this in the second period.  Later in the game, KJ Hamler fielded a punt with a fair catch to start the Lions from their 28 that later resulted in a score.  On the final Terp punt, Thompkins set up to receive the punt and it bounced out at the PSU eight.  Thompkins graduates this year.  Hamler will be returning for his second season in 2019.

 

Records not made to be broken

Fourteen inches of snow the past week and the wettest summer on record in State College and the second wettest fall on record cut down on the typical, stirring pre-game activities prior to the game on Senior Day.  Prohibited parking in grass lots, icy Central Pennsylvania roads, a wet, rainy forecast and the holiday weekend cut down the prepaid crowd of 98,000.  Many decided to remain in the comforts of their homes to watch on TV.  Pregame traditions were relegated to the sidelines and stands to preserve the playing field even after tarps were removed.  The Penn State Blue Band did get to perform at halftime despite the on-again and off-again precipitation.  The decimated but dedicated crowd in Beaver Stadium still vociferously cheered their team and honored their outgoing Seniors despite the setbacks of the elements.

Lions roar!

After forcing a punt to start the third, PSU put some younger talent on display.  Frosh RB Ricky Slade (11 carries for 64 yards, two TDs) ran the ball five times during the next series for 34 yards finishing the drive with an eight-yard TD run.  The score stood 24-3 to end the third.

Terp PK Joe Petrino failed to add the Terp score when he missed a 31-yard FG to start the fourth period.  The Lion defensed continued to dominate Maryland (5-7, 3-6) on offense holding them to 259 yards of total offense, only 74 on the ground. On PSU’s next series, McSorely finished off a scoring drive with a five-yard TD pass to Frosh TE Pat Freiermuth. Hamler’s fair catch on the 28 started another TD drive, but not before Head Coach James Franklin installed back-up QB Tommy Stevens for McSorely after the first play.

He received a standing ovation from an appreciative crowd. Most had been on hand the past four years to see McSorely and his classmates put together a 25-3 recorded at Beaver Stadium while they played here for PSU.  Stevens, entering his fifth and final year of eligibility, looms as next year’s stating QB for the Nittany Lions.  On this series, he ran for some yardage, handed off to Slade for more gains on the ground, and passed to Hamler to set up Slade’s final run of the series for a one-yard TD to finalize the score, 38-3.  The Lions and their fellow students and fans celebrated in the South end zone and sang the Penn State alma mater.  Many others of us including Kevin and me left the confines of Beaver Stadium looking for buses back to parking lots to start our journeys home in the cold and the dark to celebrate.

Regular season ends for some, not all

For the Terps, their season is over. Chances are slim with a 5-7 record to get to a bowl game.  The Lions wait to see what happens after the Big Ten Championship game between Ohio State and Northwestern next Saturday. Generally, the feeling is that with their strong, loyal fan following, they’ll most likely get into a New Year’s Day Bowl against an SEC team in Florida.

CFF.com still looks forward to five more games this season. Our next venture takes us up north to another, expectedly cold venue to attend a second round FCS playoff game in Hamilton, NY where No. 8 seed Colgate hosts 2017 FCS runner up James Madison University.  We look forward to seeing how the Red Raider defense with five shutouts (seven games in which they allowed no TDs) in 2018 against mostly Patriot League foes stand up against a Colonial Athletic team from a tougher conference that averaged 35 ppg this season.  Should be fun as we catch up with friends we made in Hamilton last season when we saw Colgate defeat Fordham at our first game ever at Colgate’s Stadium.