Teams that Penn State Football have never played or beaten

1 of 5

With all of the talk over the past couple of months about the changing conference alignments and what future schedules could look like, I thought it would be interesting to see what school Penn State football has never faced or the ones that we have never beaten (minimum of two games played). The list is both interesting and slightly shocking.

American Athletic Conference

The only school that we haven’t played outside of the current 11-team AAC is Tulsa. This isn’t overly surprising, as this list was compiled, it became obvious that the majority of the schools Penn State hasn’t played fall west of the Mississippi River. With out-of-conference games becoming more and more precious, it’s unlikely the Nittany Lions will ever host the Golden Hurricanes.

Atlantic Coast Conference

Duke: This is mildly surprising that they weren’t scheduled sometime in the mid-1900s. While their football program doesn’t hold the luster that the basketball squad does, they put together a decent year every so often. Trying to time that so playing them doesn’t hurt Penn State’s Strength of Schedule (SOS) is the tricky part.

Oct 9, 2021; Blacksburg, Virginia, USA; THE against the Virginia Tech Hokies ROTC members salute during the national anthem before the game against the Notre Dame Fighting Irish at Lane Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Reinhold Matay-USA TODAY Sports /

Virginia Tech: Damn COVID-19!! Penn State had a home-and-home contract with the Hokies that was supposed to have the first game played in Blacksburg, Virginia in September of 2020, but Covid reared its ugly head and threw everything out of whack. Virginia Tech was then able to “legitimately” back out of the contract after Penn State was unable to fulfill its end of the deal. This could be an interesting OOC opponent in the future and with continued speculation that the ACC could splinter apart, maybe they join the Big Ten.

Home/Penn State Football