In win over Illinois, Tom Allen proved this new-look Penn State team can still lean on its defense

Through Penn State’s first three games of the season, the story was junior quarterback Drew Allar’s improvement in new offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki’s system. However, when explosive plays and passing yardage were hard to come by in the Nittany Lion’s Week 5 Top-20 matchup against Illinois, new defensive coordinator, Tom Allen proved Penn State can still lean on its defense to get a big win. 

Allen came to Happy Valley to replace Manny Diaz, who took the head coaching at Duke, on James Franklin’s staff, after Allen was fired as the head man at Indiana. In Week 1, Allen’s unit held West Virginia to 12 points in Morgantown, but in Penn State’s home opener, they allowed 24 first-half points to the Falcons and Connor Bazelak, Allen’s former quarterback in Bloomington. 

That performance was alarming for a group that ranked No. 2 in the country in total defense last season and has plenty of returning talent. However, Allen had an explanation that included a raspy voice, new in-helmet communication technology, and Penn State’s all-time leading tackler Dan Connor. In Penn State’s Week 4 matchup against Kent State and Saturday’s win over Illinois, Allen moved up to the coach’s booth at Beaver Stadium and relayed his calls to Connor, now a defensive analyst with a much clearer voice, to pass on to a veteran linebacker Kobe King. 

Those same worries from the Bowling Green game resurfaced when Illinois and second-year starting quarterback Luke Altmyer marched down the field for an 11-play touchdown drive on the first possession of the game. Maybe the solution wasn’t a sophisticated game of play-call telephone and instead, it was playing back-to-back MAC opponents. Well, Allen’s defense dispelled that notion, pitching a shutout the rest of the way and continuing a run of second-half dominance. 

In Week 5, Penn State allowed just 39 second-half yards to Illinois and has yet to allow any team to gain over 100 yards in the second half this year. A season ago, when the Nittany Lions and Diaz’s defense beat the Fighting Illini 30-13 behind four interceptions from Altmyer, shutting down Bret Bielema’s team wasn’t much of an accomplishment, but this year, Altmyer has been much improved through a 4-0 start and hadn’t thrown an interception until A.J. Harris picked him off late in the fourth quarter on Saturday. 

Harris was a key offseason addition to sure up a secondary that performed very well in the team’s Big Ten opener, even without star safety Kevin Winston Jr. Though maybe the biggest move of the offseason was simply moving Abdul Carter from linebacker to defensive end, and that paid off in a huge way on Saturday night. 

Carter was named the Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week for his two-sack performance against Illinois. Through his 26 pass-rushing snaps, Carter generated eight quarterback pressures and a pass-rush win rate of 25%.

However, not all of Carter's impact came from his new position. After a relatively slow start to the season, Allen began to move Carter all of his defense, using him as the queen on the chess board. He played 30 of his 48 snaps on the edge, but both of his sacks came as a linebacker, primarily spying the mobile Illinois quarterback. That's a credit to Carter's ridiculous athleticism, but also to Allen's willingness to be creative with his defense's best player.

He is still second on the team in pressures behind Dani Dennis-Sutton, who added six more of his own in Week 5, but it was Carter’s clear breakout performance in 2024, one that could guarantee him a spot in the first round of the 2025 NFL Draft (if it wasn't already), and one that Penn State needed to get to 4-0. 

Kotelnicki’s offense has been the most exciting in the country, coming into the matchup with a 99th-percentile explosive play rate, but Illinois was able to limit Nick Singleton and Kaytron Allen’s breakaway runs, not allowing any of 15 yards, and put a lid on Allar’s deep passing game. The former five-star quarterback’s longest completion was a 20-yard pass to Harrison Wallace III and his average depth of target which was over 12 yards for the season, was cut half to 6.0 as the Illini kept everything underneath. 

The Nittany Lion offense generated just one explosive play and a 2% explosive play rate, by far their worst of the year. Yet, Penn State’s defense only allowed two the other way and while Penn State’s offense managed a 58% success rate, Illinois was held to just 38%. 

If kicker Sander Sahaydak hadn’t missed two field goals and forced Franklin to keep his offense on the field instead of attempting another, Penn State would have extended its lead and possibly covered as a 17-point favorite, but they didn’t and it didn’t matter. Even if Sahaydak or his replacement continues to struggle and if Allar and Kotelnicki have another explosive-play drought, the Nittany Lions will continue to win football games because, on Saturday night, Allen proved that his defense is going to be just fine.