All you need to know about the stubbornness of Penn State's offensive planners appeared Sept. 26 in David Jones's column in The Harrisburg Patriot-News.
The previous day, at the news conferences Coach Joe Paterno had for the Penn State beat media and for the Big Ten Conference media, Jones had some followup questions. Jones had appeared last Saturday evening with his colleague Bob Flounders in a postgame video from a dark Michigan Stadium, dissecting the Penn State offensive game plan in its 14-9 loss, calling it Cro-Magnum thinking locked into 1973. Or maybe Geico Caveman thinking.
So Jones asked Paterno if he would rewrite his game plan for Michigan now that he had had a chance to look at film, or "pictures," as Paterno had sometimes called the game video.
"It was right on target," Paterno replied, meaning his offensive plan, not senior quarterback Anthony Morelli's elliptical passes. "I wouldn't do anything differently. The only problem is, I wouldn't turn the ball over on the 8-yard line and I wouldn't fumble it on our own 10-yard line.
"Other than that, we kicked, we played good solid defense. Michigan played a heck of a football game. They had one penalty. We had three; a couple were vital. So I wouldn't do a darn thing differently."
Jones followed that up as the devil's advocate questioning Paterno's decision not to use a spread offense, especially when Oregon spread Michigan for 39 points after Division I-AA Appalachian State had done the same during the season-opening weekend for 34 points. Jones believed that those two upset winners had provided irrefutable evidence on how to score on Michigan by throwing down field.
"I don't care what other people would do," Paterno said. "That's why I get paid, to do things I think will help us win the football game. I wouldn't do anything differently."
The drive chart for the game revealed that on Penn State's eight poorest series, it netted a meager 15 yards on 25 plays.
Whatever passes Morelli could complete came from a slow-footed, tentative quarterback under a heavy pass rush coming through yet another porous line. That underscored again that Penn State has not had a dominant offensive line since the 12-0 Kerry Collins-led 1994 team.
Whatever passes Morelli had chances to complete sailed over receivers' heads or became dropped balls. His longest downfield play covered 24 yards.
The running game sputtered, especially when senior tailback Austin Scott lost his fourth fumble in 57 carries this season. Whether he remains as the starter for the next game at Illinois will be determined by how he does in the extra ball-security drills. Which is like Jose Reyes taking batting lessons with six games to play. But the Mets' shortstop passed his first test , going 3 for 5, with two home runs and four runs batted in. Will Scott, who has had one career game, against Florida State, as a sub for Tony Hunt, in the 2006 Orange Bowl, pass his test?
As Notre Dame did in Week 3 in its 38-0 drubbing at Michigan, Penn State played conservatively, and paid the price. No imagination. No trick plays. Nothing different. Playing into Michigan's arms.
Morelli might have made his best offensive moves after the game. According to Jones, "Morelli is spiritually a mess right now. He got into a shouting match with Michigan students during the final seconds of the game, then, according to a team source, flew into a brief tirade in the locker room afterward. Which is all understandable. The kid has to be as frustrated as he can be, and it's all crashing down around him."
Crashing down on Anthony Morelli, on Austin Scott and on Joe Paterno -- with Illinois looming as a more upsetting venue. Crashing down on Penn State dreams for a third national championship for the 80-year-old Paterno and on the fans who predicted a 12-0 season.
Are you satisfied with the performance of the offense to this point?
Well, I think you'd like to have had about 6 more points Saturday, yeah. But I think over all, about what I thought we'd be. Maybe (being) a little bit more careful with the football. Coughed it up a couple times and it hurt us. But I think overall pretty good. Let me answer it yeah, I'm satisfied. I think we'll get better and we'll do better, but I think considering some of the injuries we've had on the offensive line, everything else, I think we've done well.
What specifically were you impressions of Anthony's (Morelli’s) performance on Saturday? Do you think he needs to play a little better this Saturday to keep his job?
Oh, boy, how long is this press conference? I think Anthony did well enough. I think the one big mistake he made, obviously, was when he fumbled the ball in our territory. But I think over all he did a solid job. Again, maybe at the end of the game, we didn't have much time left, we were trying to get that ball up the field in a hurry, he had to run around for his life. Other than that, I think he did a good job.
(Fullback) Matt Hahn said Austin Scott was working a lot on ball-security drills in practice. Have you made any decisions on whether Rodney Kinlaw will start this week, or are you going to stick with Austin Scott?
No, I think we'll just play the game out this week and see what happens. I think Scott's been trying -- he's been very conscientious about wanting to overcome the fact that's he's put the ball on the ground a couple of times. I hate to give up on him. He's been a good kid; he's worked hard. He's been patient. I think he deserves every chance we can give him to prove that he belongs in there. So we'll play it out this week.
With the loss to Michigan, there's a growing chorus of Penn State fans who claim that Penn State should never have joined the Big Ten in the first place. How do you react to that?
I can't react to that. You say the chorus. How many are in the chorus? Sopranos, baritones, what? I can't respond to that. We're in the Big Ten, all right? It's a good conference. It's been good for the university academically, as well as for all our sports. We have to compete. We have competed. We just haven't dominated as some people want us to do.
Did you get any kind of sense of the leadership that you need to kind of get your team back on track?
I think it's got to come with me first. I think it will all come from how I respond to it and the coaching staff does because when you lose a game like that, you can only point the finger at one person: you've got to point it at the head coach.
There were plays could have been made there, decisions could have been made, so forth, even in preparation for the game. People like to be critical of this coach, this assistant coach, that assistant coach. None of those things go on without my okay. I mean, it isn't as if I'm standing out there... So I think it has to start with me. I have to be able to get across to the kids, ”Hey, we're going to get better, and we are going to get better. I'm going to get better. The staff's going to get better. You guys are going to get better.” I think that's how you approach it.
Where we are right now, as far as leadership on the team, I think that's up to me to try to make sure that there are some people who I think have the ability to be leaders and who want to do the things they way they ought to be done, have an opportunity to be leaders.
Your 2005 team was in a similar situation as this, following a tough loss to Michigan and a trip to Champaign, Ill. Do you plan to talk to them at all about that, what they can learn from the way that '05 squad handled things that year?
You have to be careful there again. This is the 2007 team. This is not the 2005 team. There are different people involved in what's going to happen. I think we'll point out to them the fact that the season's not over and that we have an opportunity with eight games left, seven Big Ten games, to still have a very, very fine season, but it's going to take some doing. Some of us have got to step to the front, including the head coach.
Are you a little disappointed you didn't try to throw the ball down the field against Michigan on Saturday, and is that something we might see going forward with the offense?
Some people said to me, “Why didn't you throw it more?” We threw the ball 50 percent of the time. I think we threw it 30, 31 times. I think we had 61, 62 total offensive plays. I don't think that was our problem.
Our problem was more the fact the field position was so bad that you had to be careful. I think we started once in Michigan's territory, at the 35-yard line. We started seven or eight times from our 20 or inside our 20 out of the 10 or 12 times we had it.
I think the fact we couldn't get the ball back from them was the biggest problem we had. They had the ball 82, 83, 84 plays. (We) kick the ball to the three yard line, we don't keep them down there. When we turned the ball over, we turned it over obviously at inopportune times.
Michigan had one penalty; we had three. Unfortunately two of ours came in very, very difficult situations for us: when we were in the red zone.
I don't know. ... I don't feel as if there's much I would do differently. I really don't. I just think they played a heck of a game. Both teams did a great job kicking. (They were) maybe a little better in the kicking game because of the fact that they get the one kickoff return that took them above the 30.
You have to give the other guy credit. Michigan played well. Played smart. Well-coached. We couldn't make anything happen. When we had a chance to make things happen, we blew it.
As I said, the two penalties obviously hurt us and the fact we fumbled the ball on the eight-yard line hurt us, both sides.
I don't want to all of a sudden say, "We're going to change, we're going to do this," because I'm not sure it's necessary.
You come out of a game like that, do you feel like you're giving your playmakers enough chances to make plays, that you're taking as much advantage?
Well, there's two ways to look at that. I didn't come out of the game with anything but the fact that we did what we thought we could get done because they played awfully soft in there. They were very alert to the wideouts.
They really challenged us to run the football, and we tried to. We didn't do as well as I thought we could with running the football. That was my decision. That was mine to make, not anybody else's. Maybe if I had to do it over again, I might change it a little bit.
I wouldn't second-guess myself on that.
You mentioned you thought Morelli played well. Are there one or two things that you can specify; areas you thought he did well in?
Well, we had long drives to make. I could tell you the couple things that he didn't do well. Obviously he fumbled the ball. He missed a kid that was wide open. But, nobody's perfect.
I think Morelli was fine.
You mentioned you and the coaching staff having to get better, too. Where do you think you need to get better?
Well, I think right now the kids are looking around to see what's going to happen. I just think we've got to make sure that we don't get off track, we don't lose confidence in them, because I think it's going to be a good football team.
You guys kept asking me last week, "How good is this team?" I kept saying, "I don't know." You were all giving me the business. I think we'll find out a lot this week. I think the coaches, it will be a challenge for us. I said a couple years ago, "If I can keep my coaching staff together, don't worry, we'll be okay."
I think I have a great coaching staff. I really do. I think it's as good as anybody has. Sometimes I may stick my two cents in there and screw them up a little bit. I think that's the part that I've got to be careful of. I've got to let them run it a little bit. When I say "run," let them do some things that I may not quite agree with.
But I think we'll stick together and go to work.
You mentioned a couple times last season that you weren't able to do some things you wanted offensively because of the inexperience of the offensive line. Do you feel that's holding you back at all this year?
I don't think we've been that bad offensively. That's the problem I can't quite figure out. We scored a lot of points until this football game. A lot of this football game was the fact of the field position. You've got to give Michigan credit. Michigan did a good job. Their kicking game was great.
As I said, they didn't turn the ball over to us except the one time. That was in our territory. Then they punted, took it out. They had the ball the whole time. The offense didn't have the ball enough for us to really kind of get into a groove. They were struggling, going uphill all the time.
I honestly feel we're not bad.
For so many years you've talked about defense and the kicking game. It seems a lot of these games you're struggling on offense. Do you find it's hard to change that? Is that still the way you are?
I disagree with you on it. That's all. I think last year at times we were an awfully good offensive football team. In 2005, we were a fine offensive football team. Other years, if I go back to '94, we probably still have the record for average yardage per game in the Big Ten. We were over 500 yards a game.
No, I don't think that. I think you start out with if you can't play defense and your kicking game isn't solid, then you don't really have a chance. But when you go to the offensive side of the football, you've got to evaluate the other guy, what he's doing, hang on to the football. Morelli didn't throw an interception in 30, 31 passes.
We've got to get better. I'm not arguing we don't have to be better. Yeah, we've got to get better. But I don't think that's got anything to do with it.
At the risk of beating a dead horse with the offense thing, in some of the games against Ohio State, Michigan, Wisconsin, you've not been able to get the ball in the end zone. Is there a common theme throughout those games, or is it just individual games where you're struggling?
Well, they haven't been able to get it in (either). You're in a tight, tough football game with two teams playing well — people don't really dominate it offensively. The games you're talking about, outside of the fact that we threw two interceptions against Ohio State a year ago, they didn't score. They scored what? (14 points). Michigan got, what, 17 points against us a year ago? Was a fine football team. Played real good defense, the whole bit.
Who else did you mention? Wisconsin didn't get a lot of points against us.
I think when you're in a tough football game, they're playing well, they're alert and so forth, you've got to be careful you don't give it to them. Sometimes when you're playing against a good defensive team, as what happened to us with Ohio State when we had to get back into it, we threw two interceptions for touchdowns. That's how they got their points. Other than that, they only got one touchdown, I think.
I think we're playing against some people that play the game the way I think most guys would like to play it. You're tough on defense. You don't make any mistakes in the kicking game. When you get some opportunities, you take advantage of them. But don't give the other guy that many opportunities. That's what has happened to us.
Can you evaluate how you thought Galen (Hall) and Jay (Paterno) did with the play-calling?
I thought they did really well.
You mentioned in big games that you can't give the defense an opportunity to make big plays when you're on offense. If you keep fumbling the ball with the conservative game plan, is there a point where you just say, either way?
We fumbled the ball twice. The quarterback fumbled it once when he was scrambling on a passing play, okay? Scott fumbled the ball on the 8-yard line. It was very close as to whether it was a fumble or not. I'm not going to argue whether he was down, not down, what have you. Two fumbles. All right? When you make statements like that, “When you keep fumbling the ball, you're going to do this, do that,†it's hard for me to answer them intelligently.
You also said Morelli threw no interceptions.
I thought that was a positive. We threw the ball 31 times. My only point was made, somebody asked me about whether we should have thrown the ball more. We threw the ball 50 percent of the time. That's all I can say. I don't want to throw it more than that, all right? I don't want to throw it more than that if I can help it because I don't think that's the way we're going to get to be a better football team; we're going to be a really dominant football team. That's the only reason I mentioned 31 passes. And outside of the fumble, he was careful with the ball. He even threw the ball away a couple of times and avoided the sack, made some improvement in that area. Should we have thrown more short hitches and things like that outside? Yeah, you can second-guess yourself, all right? But it depends on what the other guy's going to let you throw, too.
The answers, my friend, are blowing in the wind at Michigan Stadium. And as David Jones and Bob Flounders reminded their Web viewers last Saturday, Penn State is now 1-12 on the road at Michigan, Wisconsin and Ohio State. Joe Paterno's opportunity to be dominant in the Big Ten is running out of time -- and patience.
