For a moment on Saturday, Terry Smith smiled.
There hasn’t been much to smile about this 2025 Penn State football season.
The Nittany Lions, for just the fifth time in more than 130 years, were in the midst of a six-game losing streak. The head coach who started the season was long gone and now Smith manned his spot. The only trophy left to play for this year was a gigantic hunk of wood in the middle of November in East Lansing – not a shiny gold one in Miami in late January.
But when a dousing of purple Gatorade splashed over a grinning Smith, all of that washed away for a brief moment.
For that period of time, Penn State could enjoy the moment as it beat Michigan State 28-10 on Saturday.
This season will not be remembered for a win in East Lansing – or any future win for that matter. Penn State’s record this season – like a win in the middle of November – will be stuffed away into the record books as just a footnote to what this year has really been.
Penn State football has missed every expectation that Penn State – writ large – had set for 2025. For a year of preconceived celebration, there had been very little of that.
Instead, this season – by the time Penn State lost to Northwestern in early October – was about what was coming. The talk of a potential coaching search shifted to the talk of a coaching search as one loss rolled into two losses and careened into three.
From that moment on, there has only been wondering about what went wrong and what the future will hold. That wondering and worrying created a void for the present.
Finally on Saturday, though, Smith and Penn State’s football got to embrace the present.
There were no more worries about Penn State losing out. There would be no more worries about Smith, a Penn State alum, being the only head coach in Penn State history – interim or not – to go without a win in his tenure.
There was only a moment of relief as the Gatorade splashed over his shoulders.
A stout running game propelled Penn State on a 13-play, 76-yard drive that sucked time away from the game and energy from the Spartans in the fourth quarter. The ground game finished with its best performance of the year at 240 yards. The 181 from Kaytron Allen puts him just 139 away from becoming Penn State’s all-time leading rusher. Penn State’s defense, earning five sacks on the day, kept the door shut against a struggling Michigan State offense. A punt block on special teams contributed to the effort as well.
It was a moment of foundational football that has won Penn State football games time and time again that led to Smith etching a “1” in the win column. It was the effort that created that moment of joy for Smith and for Penn State.
Even hours after, though, that begins to change. The talk of the coaching search will pick right back up. The talk of roster retention will begin to dominate. Even with two weeks left in the season, there will be plenty — and only — time to discuss the future. A decision and an announcement of who replaces Smith will only fade the memory of the moment in Spartan Stadium even faster. And of course, there will always be questions of how Penn State got here.
That’s what 2025 has unexpectedly become about.
But for just a brief moment on Saturday, Penn State watched Terry Smith enjoy the present. For a moment on Saturday, Penn State and Smith could smile. For a moment on Saturday, there was something to smile about.
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