Penn State Nittany Lions at #17 Wisconsin Badgers
The Battle for 3rd Place? The Little 9 Championship? Call it what you will, but this weekend’s Penn State vs. Wisconsin game is a pretty big deal. Saturday is a chance for the Nittany Lions to earn a big win in what has been a somewhat mediocre season. This is in fact the only chance left to make a statement about the season. Anthony Morelli, Derrick Williams and the rest of the offense (other than Tony Hunt) I’m looking at you.
Penn State Gameday Central – Intercollegiate Athletics
LAST WEEK
In a windy West Lafayette, Ind., the Nittany Lions held Purdue and its formerly explosive offense scoreless. The offensive line came together against poor competition and made enough room for Tony Hunt to take over the game. The defense did not allow the Boilermakers in the red zone. The game also ended on a play that had about ten laterals and nearly saw Penn State score a defensive touchdown. More.
THIS WEEK’S OPPONENT: WISCONIN BADGERS
When it come down to it, I like the series between the Lions and Badgers. Under former coach and current A.D. Barry Alvarez, Wisconsin has become a great program all around, aside from the white shoes and fake grass at their stadium. Also, a couple of Badgers are regular WWN readers, so there is a little rivalry there. For the second year in a row one of them, dl004d has been kind enough to add a preview to the the WWN Pregame:
34-year-old Bret Bielema has replaced Barry Alvarez as head-coach. The differences have been that Wisconsin has been much more aggressive. They’ve gone for it on 4th down all over the place (not to much success so far, though), they’ve attempted fake punts, they call time-outs on defense at the end of the half to get the ball back, they don’t take a knee with a few seconds left and instead go deep.
As I’ve said, very little of that aggressiveness has actually worked. In fact, it’s burned us more than a few times.
Wisconsin’s schedule has turned out to be pretty crummy. But unlike other years, the Badgers pounded the bad opponents instead of merely squeaking by. In three straight games, Wisconsin scored the most points of any three-game B10 stretch in school history:
52-17 over Indiana
41-9 over Northwestern
48-12 over Minnesota
Is it just me or is dl004d being pretty hard on a 8-1 team? I wish I had his problems.
But the Badgers turned in a clunker last week, beating Illinois 30-24 after being down by 18 points.
I know that clunker, I have seen that clunker. Illinois is growing up quickly.
The Wisconsin papers have reported that ABC wanted to make this a night game, but Joe Paterno vetoed it (as is the right of the visiting team for last-moment schedule changes). Wisconsin isn’t too pleased with the 11 a.m. (local time) start. You’ll see a lot of empty seats in the north endzone when the game starts, as the students typically don’t show up until the middle of the 2nd quarter. (They don’t sell beer at games, so students hang out at house parties until the last moment.) (This is a source of frustration among die-hard fans.)
Re: fans — Penn State has similar problems and I share the frustration of the latecoming students, though I don’t mind beer is not for sale in the stadium.
Side note: the Penn State folks treated me well last year in Happy Valley. I hope Wisconsin fans will be as hospitable.
Well, Madison survived Halloween, so maybe there is hope. I really wanted to be one of those fans, but it did not work out this year. Maybe in 2008.
Weaknesses:
Good news for PSU since the DBs are young, but improving.
More good news, other than placekicking, Penn State has been better than average on special teams this year.
Strengths:
Doesn’t it seem like Wisconsin always has a QB who has started for 5 or 6 years?
Penn State has shown to be quite vulenrable to throws underneath, so this is very troubling.
Not good news for a struggling corps of wideouts.
Our defensive line is improving, but still quite vulenrable.
Question mark:
With a healthy P.J. Hill, I predict a 26-20 Wisconsin victory.
By the way, I welcome these contributions from fans of the opposition for every game.
NO RANKING
Penn State is still unranked but has an opprutunity to get back in it this week. A win in Wisconsin equals Top 25.
PRESS CONFERENCE
IMPORTANT ARTICLES
BEANO WATCH
Carroll H. Cook (Pitt ’54) has literally been phoning in his chats for years – he doesn’t have a computer. As of late though, it seems he is figurateively phoning them in. He seems annoyed by the whole enterprise. I mean, when was the last time you heard him mention Casablanca? Anyway, he kind of talked about Penn State this week.
Bernard (Princeton, NJ): Penn State vs Wisconsin this weekend for #3 in the Big Ten. Any thoughts?
SportsNation Beano Cook: Wisconsin has been one of the surprise teams of the year and the transition to Bielema has been smooth. It has been a disgrace that the league did not go to nine league games, and the Badgers don’t play Ohio State this season or next. A key is RB PJ Hill, who is back in practice now and that helps. Wisconsin will probably be in Florida for its bowl if it wins this game.
Wisconsin and Penn State will probably be in Florida either way, they are playing for Orlando over Tampa, Disney over Busch Gardens.
Paul (Seattle, WA): Beano – any predictions on which coach will finish their carrer with more wins, Paterno or Bowden. Two years ago I thought Bowden would run away from Parterno, but now I am not so sure.
SportsNation Beano Cook: I think Paterno has a good chance to pass Bowden. Paterno has a chance to make up some more ground this season.
That would be great, but generally, whatever Beano predicts about Penn State goes the other way.
TELEVISION
ABC is broadcasting the game as a split national telecast. Brad Nessler, Bob Griese, Paul Maguire and Bonnie Bernstein will be involved. They could probably do without th e last two. I used to think Bernstein was one of the better sideline reporters, but I don’t like the way she talked about Paterno during the Ohio State game this year. Coverage Map.
Speaking of sideline reporters the best all-time sideline reporter will probably be available to return to the airwaves by Wednesday morning.
MORE COVERAGE
PREDICTIONS
Wisconsin is just too balanced and is playing at home. I just don’t believe the Penn State offense is running smooth enough to pull an upset. Sadly, I predict the Nittany Lions will fall 24-16.
IN CLOSING
Go STATE, beat Badgers!