Penn State has now won two Big Ten conference games, and needs one more win to make a bowl game. The Lions, according to Matt Campbell, looked in the mirror during the bye week, and made adjustments to how they would approach the second half of the season.
Against Washington, we might have seen that reflection. Recall a brisk afternoon on September 26. Penn State builds up an early lead on Wisconsin, 17-0. From there, the Lions start to go into “milk the clock” mode even though there was an entire
half of football left to play. Little by little, the Badgers started making plays to inch closer, and, as the game came to its closing minutes, take the lead. We all know what happened from there.
Fast forward to Saturday. The Nittany Lions take a similar lead against Washington, and with a half left to play, the Huskies made their adjustments. Little by little, it looked like Wisconsin all over again. 22-point lead turns into 19. Then 11, then, after the second touchdown and two-point conversion, Penn State was suddenly up only three with about eight minutes left to play.
Then, something we hadn’t seen all season happened. Penn State used the entirety of that seven minutes and 40 seconds left on the clock, forced Washington to use every single time out, and closed out the game, right there and then. They saw the same situation they confronted earlier this season, and found away to fight tooth and nail and come out with a win.
And here’s the thing about looking in the mirror. Sometimes you’ll see things that you can’t change. Other times you see things that can easily be corrected. But most of the time, what you’ll see is something that may not be perfect, may need work, but, with enough time and practice, can get better. That was this Washington game. In an ideal world Penn State keeps scoring and it’s never a game. In an ideal world, none of us have to even mention how bad the refereeing was in this contest. In an ideal world, all of the issues that plagued the team all season long magically go away.
But it isn’t an ideal world. It’s the world we live in. And, given the team they have, all we can hope for is continued and consistent improvement, so that the next time they look in the mirror, they have one less thing they need to improve upon.
Stats and storylines
105 – It had been 105 years since Penn State last played at Washington. As Matt Campbell joked, at least they didn’t have to travel by train.
Another one – Penn State had another 150+ yard day on the ground. If they keep this going, they might fool us all into believing they have a running game.
In scores of other games – Ohio State, Michigan, and Penn State will, for the first time in the Lions’ 33-year tenure as a Big Ten program, all be out of contention for the conference championship. At least one of those three had been in the running every season for the past 33 years. In fact, this is the first time all three stand to finish outside the top 3 in the conference, let alone conference contention. History in the making.
Speaking of mirrors – Penn State is getting fractionally better by the week. Michigan is going in the other direction. How happy are Utah fans right now?
