Penn State Football: Black, Orange, and Maize are the new White

Penn State Football is famous for its yearly White Out game in front of 109,000 fans. The tables will turn in 2022.

Penn State Football has created one of the greatest atmospheres in college football by having a simple request of fans, “WEAR WHITE.” This phenomenon creates what Kirk Herbstreit once called, “An Avalanche of sound.”

The White Out game has a better reputation than the results that it has created. Since James Franklin took over in 2014, Penn State is 4-3 in one of the toughest atmospheres opposing teams will face.

Granted, the annual White Out game comes against Penn States’ toughest home opponent.

This season, three opposing teams have announced that they will have an “(insert color here) out.”

Penn State will open the season against Purdue, who has announced it will be a “blackout” game. Penn State has seen this before from a lesser opponent. That game ended up 59-0 in favor of the Nittany Lions (sorry, not sorry, Maryland). Penn State actually won the student section of the week for a road game.

Two weeks later, Penn State will head south to face an “All-Auburn, All-Orange” game. This one makes sense. It’s payback from last season when Auburn traveled to State College and witnessed the White Out firsthand. One thing Auburn will not have working in its favor is, that this game will be played at 3:30 and not under the lights.

Follow that up a month later when Penn State will head to Michigan and face their annual “Maize-Out” game. I’m conflicted on which color is less intimidating, Orange or Yellow.

That old saying, “Often imitated, never duplicated,” comes to mind.

Penn State faces a difficult schedule for an offense that struggled to score last season and a defense that is replacing most of its starters. Now with the addition of three “color-out” games for now (looking at you Indiana, please do a “Cream Out”), winning on the road just got that much harder.