The Penn State Football Show

Drew, I agree with pretty much everything you said. Norwood is the man and is one tough kid. I was very glad to see him come back from that.

You mentioned Herbstreit... I think the announcing overall was terrible: they basically implied the game was over in the first half, and while it wasn't looking good, it definitely wasn't over. In fact, PSU had a legitimate shot to get back in it with about 4 minutes to go, down 14 and the ball at about midfield. And even then, the announcers didn't even acknowledge the fact that PSU was a score and an onsides kick away from being right in it. They assumed Penn State's only mission was to make the score respectable, and not to actually win the game. Knowing Pete Carrol and USC and what was at stake, there is no way they lightened up in the second half. They were still trying to score without a doubt.

As I said before, the reason PSU lost was the pathetic performance of the secondary, and I believe it was the scheme that was to blame. Drew was right, they saw it on film and completely exposed it. My question is, why did Penn State not adjust to this mid-game? Clearly USC was throwing at will against the zone coverage. Why not make a change and go man for a few plays? They never tried this, and I will never understand. Maybe Penn State doesn't even have man coverage in their playbook! They rely way too heavily on zone, and it gets burned too easily. I still don't know why more teams don't rip it apart like USC did, but A CHANGE NEEDS TO BE MADE. That was a simple in-game adjustment that was never made, and I don't know how a coach can allow that to happen.

Just take a look at these quotes from USC players:
Damian Williams

"They played a lot of vanilla stuff and just tried to prevent the big play," said Williams in the boisterous Trojan locker room. "They were very disciplined, very structured.

"But, at the same time, when you're so schooled and so disciplined, it kind of turns into machine mode. And we were able to find gaps in the defense and Mark had a heck of a day."

And Patrick Turner: "If you want to play back against us, I don't believe that's the way to do it, really," Turner said. "We have really talented receivers, and if you're standing in one spot, we're running to the hole." "We saw that on film, that they really like to run a lot of zone. I didn't see much man out there tonight. They were just backing off."