I don’t know. The punting wasn’t perfect?
What do you want me to complain about?
Penn State just beat the bricks off of Buffalo, 55-13. Quite frankly, that score suggests the game was closer than it actually was. Somehow.
This is slightly a continuation of many of the thoughts I had after Penn State also beat the bricks off of Marshall to open the season. Those thoughts were slightly paused for the first 25 minutes of last week’s win over Temple.
I can’t help but think there is so little to gripe about with this team and part of that may be because we’ve spent the last few seasons trained to be of the viewpoint that something wrong is a small crack that will eventually bring down the foundation.
But with the way Penn State is playing to start this season, even if the opponents aren’t powerhouses by any means so far, there is an air of optimism and hopefulness that is blatantly refreshing enough to stop me or you from looking for the little things to nitpick at.
Penn State – who spent the last six days prior to Saturday’s kickoff worried about the running game – ran the ball for a collective 304 yards. It was highlighted by a Quinton Martin Jr. run for 61 yards and a Cam Wallace touchdown run for 59 yards. That’s after neither of them was a major factor – especially Martin who didn’t get a single carry – against Temple.
Penn State quarterback Rocco Becht seems to be surrounded by a tight end room and a wide receiver room that are effective weapons as he threw for another 212 yards before heading to the bench early in the third quarter because Penn State was up 34-3.
Koby Howard became the first Penn State wide receiver to have two 100-yard games in a season since 2021 thanks to one of those passes from Becht that went for 70 yards and a score.
Penn State’s defense allowed just 173 yards total, including just 60 through the air and that was with one of the top wide receivers in the country – regardless of school or conference – on the field in Chance Morrow.
Poke holes in the big things and Penn State pokes you right back. Even in the small things, which seemed to ruffle the feathers of Matt Campbell a bit after the game, Penn State is erasing the anxiousness that has lingered over this team, football stadium, fan base and maybe even the livestock that lives around campus.
“Not where we need to be, but I think a team that has certainly grown in different entities each week,” Campbell said after the game. “Still a team that, in my opinion, has got so much ability and some things that were focal points for us today, and then we grew in some areas that were really a difficult focal point.”
But in fairness to him, he’s not seen some of the things we’ve seen around these parts.
Penn State fans have been so trained to worry about the big games and maybe only the big games that they have sucked the joy out of the fandom because when that’s all that matters, and that’s all that goes wrong, then there isn’t much to be happy about.
Of course, this Penn State team has not seen a tough opponent yet. Conference play is now six or so days away – and they will be the games that define this season yet again. But no one seems to have been thinking about that on Saturday inside Beaver Stadium. Instead, they were watching Penn State generally dominate in a way that has made Penn State Football™ feel fun again — even when the head coach seems to potentially not share all of that sentiment.
Becht’s ability to spread the ball around – and the ability of Penn State’s various pass-catchers to actually catch the ball – has made this offense fun to watch in a way that Penn State has not seen maybe in 10 years. Zay Robinson, who returned eight punts on Saturday because of how stout Penn State’s defense was, has become must-see entertainment because it feels like a matter of when, not if, of turning one of those returns into points.
And when Penn State has allowed just nine meaningful points this season, everyone is in a better mood when Penn State’s defense plays like it’s supposed to, regardless of who the head coach is.
When those things happen like they have, there is little to grumble about elsewhere. The fundamental mood inside that stadium today – as it was two weeks ago – feels noticeably different even if there isn’t anything tangible to quantify why that is. Fans don’t get to put up points on the scoreboard or get key stops on defense. So when nothing truly goes wrong or when things that do go wrong get corrected – as Penn State proved with the running game today – the grumpiness meter dips to almost unmeasurable levels. But even Nathan Tiyce’s one punt that went for a touchback when it probably shouldn’t have felt like it has this fan base unfazed.
Penn State fans missed this feeling and maybe that’s what so many people are embracing right now. There are nine football games left in this season and that leaves nine opportunities for things to take a different turn. But for right now – as they did for the nine or so months leading up to the start of football season after Campbell was hired – things feel to be moving in a positive direction.
Where and how quickly that direction continues to move is what the rest of this football season is for. But for now, I’m going to complain about something else. What that is, I don’t know but it won’t be the way Penn State is playing football right now.
If you’ve enjoyed this content, please subscribe to Stuff Somers Says With Steve on YouTube. Or join our newsletter by entering your email below.
