Penn State Football vs Auburn – White Out too Much for the SEC

Penn State Football took down the Auburn Tigers by a final score of 28-20 in front of a White Out crowd at Beaver Stadium on Saturday night.

Auburn was supposed to win this game easily…according to most of their fanbase, but Penn State Football and their fans had other ideas.

Penn State Football quarterback Sean Clifford had probably the best game of his career. Clifford finished 28-of-32 (87.5% completion percentage), for 280 yards and two touchdowns. The Nittany Lions‘ defense also stepped up when they needed to.

Much of Penn State Football’s success offensively was through the air. Jahan Dotson had an incredible game, hauling in 10 passes for 78 yards, and the first touchdown of the night for either team. Tight end Brenton Strange also played well, finishing with four catches for 71 yards and a touchdown.

Penn State once again struggled to get the running game going, finishing with just 83 rushing yards as a team. They did find the end zone twice on the ground, though.

Overall, offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich called a great game. He drew up a great double pass, in which Jahan Dotson completed a 22 yard pass to tight end Tyler Warren.

Defensively, Penn State struggled to stop Auburn running back Tank Bigsby for much of the night. Bigsby is one of the best running backs in the country, and he showed why tonight. Thankfully, that is probably the toughest running back the Nittany Lions will have to face this season.

Penn State’s pass defense, however, was as advertised. The Nittany Lions held Bo Nix to just 185 yards, and no touchdowns. Despite multiple times where Penn State Football got pressure on Nix, they were never able to get home and drop Nix for a sack. Arnold Ebiketie did have three QB pressures.

Brandon Smith paced the Nittany Lions defense with 10 total tackles, six of them being solo tackles, and one of them being a tackle for loss.

Overall, this Penn State Football had an impressive showing for not only themselves, but for the Big Ten Conference on Saturday night. They went down a couple times early, but they showed resilience and bounced back.

Defensively, the Nittany Lions will need to continue to improve against the run, but they were able to escape with a win against one of the best rushing attacks in the country. The offense showed the ability to push the ball downfield, and Sean Clifford finally played to his potential against a great secondary.

After overcoming some questionable officiating, Penn State is now 3-0, with two wins over ranked opponents, and they seem to be trending upward nationally following a statement win over a very good SEC opponent. Good teams win, great teams cover (the spread).