Penn State Football rides momentum, defense seals 16-10 win at Wisconsin
By Nick Kreiser
Penn State Football escaped Madison with a 16-10 win over the 12th ranked Badgers, and there are a lot of takeaways, both good and bad, from the week one win.
One thing is for sure, the Penn State Football defense looked great on all levels Saturday afternoon.
The players who needed to step up did so, including Jaquan Brisker who was one of my key players for this game.
Offensively, there are certainly a lot of things that need to be ironed out going forward, but all in all, they played pretty well in the second half. Jahan Dotson also played as expected, scoring the Nittany Lions‘ first touchdown of the season. Noah Cain also did a great job of making guys miss most of the second half, and it is nice to see him get through week one without injury.
These are some of the major takeaways from the Nittany Lions’ nail-biting win over Wisconsin.
Takeaway #1 – Offensive Line NEEDS to Improve
For much of the first half, the Penn State offensive line struggled both to give running backs holes to run through, and also to give Sean Clifford time in the pocket. As a result, the Nittany Lions only had one first down in the first half.
Being that Clifford did not have much time to throw the ball, Mike Yurcich was stuck calling a lot of short passes and screens, especially early in the game.
Even when Noah Cain was able to gain positive yards, a lot of it was on runs outside the tackles because the offensive line struggled to get a push up front. This almost cost them the game, when Noah Cain could not gain many yards late in the fourth quarter to pick up a first down and ice the game. Instead, Penn State had to punt and force the defense to get one last stop.
The Penn State Football offensive line allows two sacks and seven tackles for loss today vs the Badgers, most of it coming in the first half.
This offensive line should be able to work some things next week against Ball State, and hopefully will be less of an issue going forward. If they can do that, Mike Yurcich will be able to open the playbook more.