The Temple Owls made Penn State sweat a little bit in Week 2, but head coach Matt Campbell's reaction should have caught Penn State fans' attention. In the first half, the Nittany Lions struggled to separate from the Owls because of costly red-zone errors and a missed field goal by Ryan Barker, but their second-half response impressed Campbell and left him feeling the blue and white could take away a lot of positives.
“I would just say that’s probably the proudest that I can be, and it’s what I told our guys in the locker room,” Campbell said. “I felt like nobody flinched, nobody wavered. There was no complaining. And I think some of that can easily happen, but the reality is all three phases kind of faltered earlier, right?"
It's easy to forget
that if it weren't for a touchdown fromRocco Becht to Ben Brahmer to end the half, the score would have been deadlocked at 3 headed into the break. However, during that time, Rocco Becht was able to display why he is the most experienced, and potentially most efficient college football QB in the country. He had 12 straight completions from the end of the first half through the opening minutes of the third quarter to get the team back on track.
"Rocco steps up. He makes big plays in big moments to kind of get you back into the football game", said Campbell of his QB. Still, there were moments where Campbell also made his displeasure known, especially when it came to finsihing drives. The fact that big plays weren't rewarded with points and turnovers by the defense didn't bolster the red zone offense either caused a lot of issues.
"I don’t think there’s any explanation other than we didn’t play very well,” Campbell said. “We didn’t play very well in the first half or the first quarter of the game offensively."
While Penn State can walk away with a win, there are still a lot of issues to be fixed ahead of Week 3.
This article originally appeared on Nittany Lions Wire: Matt Campbell addresses issues, praises response after Week 2 win
