PSU 35 ILL 17

I was there.

And here are my friends:

Pictured PSU fans (top row, from left to right): Mikey, Zac, Brian, and Kevin.

Pictured PSU fans (bottom row, from left to right): Darren, Richard, Adam, Sameena

Also, a second screenshot:

That's Mike, my roommate on the far right side of the picture.

AND THEY'RE ALL FRIENDS OF MINE, EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THEM, NO BETTER AND NO WORSE.

...And we'll probably end up down there together when it's all over. And that's why we say: B-bay-b-bay-b-bay-b-bay-bay-ba-baby...

Christ, what a trip. 35 hours of total driving, many of which were spent in the RV playing craps and drinking.

This week, PSU is off. Well, for all intents and purposes, they are.

PSU "B" Team: 45

EIU: 6

God, I'm still hurting from last weekend. Hangovers tend to linger as one ages, but this one is ridiculous.

....Wha' happen'd?

O God. So hungover. Feels like I'm in the " just woke up in the mothership" scene in Fire in the Sky....

What day is it? Thursday? ARE YOU F$%KING KIDDING ME?

Last I remember, PSU was up by 10 on Saturday night. Iowa was reeling under the awesome might of the White Out and my drunken mind-bullets. A victory was assured.

So, like, we won right?......Right? What?

/stares blankly
/eyes dilate

/eyes cross

/shakes head

/opens bottle of Old Granddad

/turns on The Cure

F$%k it. I'm going to Illinois this weekend. Let the blackouts ensue.

Now if I can find a soap that washes away failure and laundry marker, I'll be set.

'Cuse Recap, Iowa Fishin'

'Cuse Recap
We won. Awesome. The pain has mostly subsided, and the preseason is over. Let the real season begin.

F$%kin' Iowa, Man

Remember last year when we pantsed OSU on national TV, and then went undefeated coming into Kinnick Stadium? Remember how Iowa had lost to Pitt that season, but had started looking competent the previous week? Remember how that game ended on that cold afternoon? You don't?, Here's a quick reminder:

Look at it. I SAID F%^KING LOOK AT IT. DO YOU SEE? Now don't look. NOW LOOK BELOW:

To say the least, last year's matchup was disappointing. The weather sucked, PSU forgot the sideline heaters, and opted to pass into the wind 3 times on it's opening possession. PSU had multiple chances to put this game away in the first half, but kept coming up with field goals. And then Iowa realized that they weren't the team who lost to Pitt. Or something.

I was so depressed after this game that I spent $250 on dinner for me and the ex at the Capital Grille.

But all that is done with. Iowa has been owning our collective keister's now for the better part of the past 10 months, and it ends on Saturday.

Preview
Iowa started the year with a near bedshitting to Northern Iowa. I watched. This wasn't the Iowa team that dominated the backstretch of their schedule and postseason. This was the Iowa team that lost to Pitt. They won on two FG blocks at the end of regulation. The skin of their teeth, indeed.

No, I say throw that game out. The Iowa team that rolls into town on Saturday is the one that blew out Arizona and Iowa state. Let's take a look at the relevant stats from Iowa's two games vs. PSU's season:

Offense
(all stats from ESPN, BSD, and big12sports.com)

Statistic (units) : Iowa/ PSU

Rush (yds/game) : 162/ 133.3

Pass (yds/game) : 220/ 264.0

PPG : 31/ 30.0

Sacks (allowed/game) : 2.0/ 1.67

Turnovers (lost/game): 1.5/ 2.0

Defense

Pass (yds/game) : 109.0/ 166.0

Rush (yds/game) : 149.0/ 46.3

Turnovers (rec'vrd/game) : 3.5/ 1.33

Sacks (inflicted/game) : 1.0/ 3.33

PPG : 10.0/ 6.67

For a PSU victory:
PSU needs to limit the turnovers, run the ball, and wreak havoc in the Iowa backfield. Earth-shattering, eh?

For an Iowa Victory:
Keep picking off Clark, stack the line, and dominate special teams.

Other stuff:
Sean Lee is out for the week. Ouch. He would have a field day, considering Iowa dominating LT Bryan Beluga is on the mend.

The good news? Navarro Bowman is back from his groin issues, so that sheds some of the Lee injury evil mojo. But not all.

Other bad news includes Stupar tweaked his ankle in practice this week. I would feel much better with him in the lineup this week.

Intangibles:
PSU has them all-a home game, at night, revenge, and the whiteout. Plus, I heard Stanzi called Jack Crawford's mother a "stink pig".

Final Thoughts:
I have no problems with the PSU offense in this game. However, I do have issues with the defense, the onus of which will be on the defensive line. The tackles have to make up for Lee's presence (or lack thereof), and must get some heat on on Stanzi. The line can handle Iowa's running game, it's just I fear that PSU goes into the dreaded "rush four tired lineman late in the game, back the corners off" EPIC FAIL gameplan. We saw how that ended last year. Rush 4 with a "joker" LB shooting the gaps. Their armor is weak on the left side, and that's where the first point of attack should be. Above all else, exploit the mismatches created by the inexperienced Beluga replacement.

Iowa 13

PSU 20

Let's Go Fishing
Iowa reminds me of the King Mackerel, aka the "Kingfish"

Noted parallels include:

• The kingfish has one hell of a bite, and will make you work for a victory. Any weakness in skill will be exploited. Ditto Iowa.
• The kingfish is higher in the food chain in its realm. The same can be said for Iowa to this point in our schedule.
• I usually haul 2 out of every 8 hits in. Kind of like the success rate of PSU vs. Iowa.
• They are a very striking looking fish-the above picture does no justice to it's rather distinct appearance in blue waters. I've always liked Iowa's uniforms.
• Thoroughly enjoyable to fight and land. Best consumed when smoked. Just like Iowa.
• Children and pregnant women should stay away from both of them due to high mercury content.

Recently, I haven't caught many. When I do, yer for damn sure I light up afterwords.

Trap Game?

Meh, it already happened last night with Ole Miss.

'Cuse Recap, Temple Fishing

The Pain remains. In fact, in some aspects, it's actually a little worse. What I saw in the Syracuse game was a sincere effort to run between the tackles, only to have Syracuse repeatedly stack the line. At one point, PSU even decided to swap the tackles out for underclassmen. The effects were negligible.

I have no idea what's wrong here. Conspiracy theorists say we are waiting for the B10 schedule to start, and then the Lions unleash the Kraken. I say nuts to that. It's Akron and Syracuse. We should be torching these guys. Unless, of course, by "Kraken", one means "Navarro Bowman".

Then again, the rational side of me says that on every running down, Akron and Syracuse were putting 6 on the line to clog the middle. This seems more plausible, and would explain why Clarke can hit his receivers with ease. I'd like to think it's because Clark is proficient at his job.

Nevertheless, the game balls go to:

• Zug and Moye. Hands like Velcro. Gonna get Clark paid next year.
• Sean Lee. No explanation necessary.
• Jeremy Boone. Boomin' punts at 50 yds/per.

Was going to hand one out to Quarless for solid play, but then he went and did this...... Just when he shows signs of improvement, he has to remind us of why he screwed up the last 2 years of his life.

Gone Fishin'

So for the third scrimmage, these chumps come to town. They're not that good. They have this weird tendency to lose games on the last play. They are from the badlands in Philadelphia. Only one fish comes to mind:

The Flounder

Noted parallels include:

• Early in their life cycle, they look normal. As they progress, their one eye migrates, and the result is that ugly bastard above. Just like a Temple game. Starts off alright, and then, well, the above is an appropriate metaphor.
• A flounder is also known as a "Fluke". See above noted Temple game endings.
• At this point in evolution, the flounder isn't really that ferocious of a predator. Either is Temple, but they have potential.
• Are found inland. So is Temple.
• Only defense is to blend in. If they fail, they die. Have you ever been to Temple's campus? At night?
• Easy to catch. And throw a bunch of crabs on top just to see what happens. Just like Bill Cosby. End analogy.

Really, at this point, I have confidence in every facet of the PSU game, except for the above noted deficiency. If PSU can break 150 yds on the ground, I will have considered it a step in the right direction.

Temple 3

PSU 31

Moving on.....
Part of me screaming "BOISE AT FRESNO BOISE AT FRESNO". Nah, even though I don't like Boise too much. Cal at Minnesota? No, but kudos for the good OOC scheduling. Let's go for USC at Washington. Why? USC always has one bad loss per season, and it usually is on the road. They are a little dinged from OSU. So screw them.

'Cuse

If you haven't read BSD's review of the history between Syracuse and PSU, please do so (click nyaw and nyaw). I'll wait....

Truly inspiring. Syracuse really needs to attain competancy in football again. The spite born in the Harding administration must be rekindled. I cannot think of a more approprate team that we could consider to be our "rival". I would drop kick a nun just for an oppurtunity to be at the 1955 game. The Lenny Moore-Jim Brown dual must be on constant loop on cable in heaven.

And there would be more here, but the computer just ate the rest of my post.

Syracuse 13
PSU 41

PSU 31 Akron 7

Welcome back, Joe

Well, I was going to watch the game which was supposedly DVR'd, but the TV listings provided by Verizon are inaccurate at best. What I got was the Iowa game. So this recap is based on misdirection and Guinness-soaked memories from a Juno Beach bar. And being a Philly fan, it's only pertinent I begin with the negatives*.

The body has a weird way of dealing with pain. One example of the brain's gating mechanism when confronted with severe pain is displayed in the House episode "Detox". House performs necessary masochism to erase the physical side effects of Vicodin withdrawal. He does this by taking a pestle and smashing it directly into his fingers, breaking them. Thus, House's brain only registered the pain coming from his hand, and not the soul-eating sensations of withdrawal. Crude, yes, but then again, it worked, didn't it? I laughed. Now come back to last Saturday's game.

PSU was supposed to have a bunch of glaring deficiencies. I saw a few of note; the kicker was inconsistent, both TEs were poor in blocking, etc. All of these can be worked on and corrected over the next scrimmage or two. Enter the pain analogy.

Nothing seemed more out of place then the running game. There were numerous occasions where the OL was whiffing on assignments, guards were late in pulling, and so forth. And that's not to place all blame on the men with no necks; Royster was making too many moves behind the LOS, and Green just couldn't get his timing down. I understand that new OLs take time to gel, but at times the unit just looked incompetent. The line looked more than adequate in pass protection, which I always presumed to be the tougher of the two options.

Akron had one of the worst rushing defenses in all D-I last year, and I highly doubt they get their shit together in the ten months or so from their last game. In their first game of the year. On the road. Against Penn State. Alarms are going off here.

So yeah, I care not about the little problems. It's that significant pain the rushing game that has my immediate attention.

Then again, it's just the first game; how much do we really know about a team after one game? I probably am overreacting, and we all know how House feels about this.

So yeah, game balls go to:

• Darryl Clark
• Derrick Moye
• Chaz Powell
• Every DT
• Stuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuper
• Devon Smith - because we all root for the little guy. It's the American way, you commie pimp.

*segue not included

Gone Fishin' (Akron)

Most other blogs are giving detailed analysis of the Zips right now. You will not get that here. Instead, please read the following:

A few years ago, I went deep-sea fishing off the shores of Juno Beach. It was addicting. Like jamming-your-head-in-a-bag-full-baldness-curing-crack addicting.

Sometimes one snags a leviathan. The rod bows to the ocean, one is jerked toward the rail. The reel squeals its alarm, and the fight is on. It can take seemingly eons of back breaking reeling, releasing, and reeling again just to bring the fish near the boat. The arms cramp, the hands are screaming just to let go. In the fit of all this mayhem, one still needs to concentrate.

It's almost euphoric the feeling of finally gaffing and landing a real fighter. When the fish is in the deck cooler, and one finally has straightened out one's digits, the world just seems lighter.

Sometimes the fish gets away. It can be due to the incompetence of others, random luck, lack of experience, or being just straight beat by a superior being. And when any of this happens, it can be a bit of a letdown. Still, there is always hope for redemption; grab some bait, re-rig the line, and cast again.

Even if I don't catch anything worth keeping, it is still just satisfying to get out there and fight with the sea creatures. Afterwords, at the Square Grouper, everyone feels like a winner. The feeling increased after every round of drinks consumed.

In some ways, the same can be said for college football.

We all know its inherent addictive powers. Regardless of who PSU plays, I think we can all agree that at the beginning of the season, we are just happy to be here. As the season starts, we all have dreams of PSU football destroying OSU at home, TCOB in Ann Arbor, or even a major bowl victory against a traditional BCS powerhouse. We pray there will be no game which ends in "the one that got away" due to our own incompetence, said random luck, or being just plain outplayed. Every week, the anticipation of The Game leads up to relative milliseconds of sheer havoc, terror, bliss, and hopefully triumph.

At the end of the day, we all end up at the Grouper. And while we're at it, we may even have a tale or two to spin about how we won against that trophy fish.

And it's now within our grasp. It's 6 AM on Saturday. We've got our gear. We've got sandwiches, beer, and are walking down the dock. Our tickets are punched, our spots on deck are assured, and I spy calm seas. Now lower that fucking gangplank and let us aboard.

AKRON

So this is PSU's first game of the year. It's not a bad choice given the cupcake pool. The best comparison I can draw between Akron and fishing is the Atlantic Bonito:

Usually the first animal to strike my line in the morning. They hit hard, and tendencies include running aimlessly all over creation. Also, they can be relatively difficult to land in the beginning. Usually they quit fighting after about 5-10 minutes. Hopefully, just like Akron.

They are an impressive fish to look at. However, it's oily, dark meat is unpalatable (the Cubans love'em though). Upon looking at the last sentence, it appears there might be some non-hetero racism there. Nope, this paragraph is not part of the analogy. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Uses include carving up for bait, and for tourists seeking a sense of accomplishment.

Still, they are fun to catch and promptly smack over the head with a paddle. and I'm sure the football players agree.

Expectations

Realistically, I am just looking at this game to see how apparent our team shortcomings are. This includes:

• Will the secondary hold up against a semblance of a passing game?
• Will the DL be strong or weak?
• Will there be any chemistry between Clark and the green WR corps?
• Will Josh Hull show improvement from last year?

As you can see, my concerns really lie within the defense. Which is weird, being that THIS IS LBU. Still, graduation, transfers, and injuries IMO have greatly depleted the defense.

Really, I just want to see competency on both sides of the ball, and no injuries.

Akron: 10

PSU: 40

One More Thing...

This one's a no-brainer: Nevada vs (23) Notre Dame. Reasons:

1. Fuck Notre Dame.
2. Fuck Jimmah Clausen. I hope he gets the Feline Aids.
3. One would think the majority of their fan base would have some kind of humility after this past decade of failure. Nope. Fuck them, and the world grows stronger at Chuck Weis crying into his fat tits.

No, really, this week's award is presented just based on my spiteful and inane bias. Hell, nobody really knows how teams are shaping up until 5 weeks or so into the schedule anyway.

Final Notes

A tip of the cap this week goes to TOSU, and their plans to give the Navy Midshipmen a standing O when they enter the 'shoe. Class exemplified (unlike my ND rant above). Rutgers, take notes.