Penn State Football: Position grades versus Iowa

Penn State football won its second straight game on Saturday in sloppy conditions at Beaver Stadium vs. Iowa, 30-24

Penn State was able to hang-on this time in the fourth quarter to win their first game at home since they beat Kent State on September 15th. The game was as strange of a game as Penn State has played since they played Iowa in 2017.

Iowa managed to score 24 points against Penn State while only scoring six points on offense, so you can say it was potentially the best defensive performance the Nittany Lions have put together all season.

The Hawkeyes scored their other 18 points on a special teams touchdown, a defensive touchdown, and two safeties. Also, 12 of these 24 Iowa points were scored within the first ten minutes of the game, which isn’t good for Penn State, but shows how well they did play the rest of the game.

The other notable part of this game was Trace McSorley’s injury, as he went down in the second quarter with what appeared to be a serious knee injury. This is the first time in McSorley’s career that we’ve seen him go down, and stay down, but just as he has been his whole career, he was a fighter, and later returned to the game.

After being up 27-17 going into the fourth quarter, Penn State certainly made it a bit scary for all 105,000 fans in attendance after turning the ball over twice, and allowing Iowa to get to the Nittany Lions’ three-yard line while only down six points.

Nick Scott played the hero role though, by intercepting a pass thrown by Hawkeyes’ quarterback Nate Stanley.

The following Iowa possession in the last minute of the game resulted in another huge Penn State defensive stand, something that hasn’t been common in the fourth quarter of games lately. This was a huge win, as Penn State moved to 6-2 on the season and will go to Ann Arbor next weekend to face fifth-ranked Michigan.

Check out Penn State’s position grades for the win over Iowa.