The Penn State Football Show

Pete, I too am really itching to watch this game. It should be a great test for Penn State, and in my opinion (although it may even be a fact) USC has the best football players in the nation. For the past 5 years this has been true. They are the New York Yankees of college football, but instead of using copious amounts of money to get players to play for them, they use the grandeur of Hollywood to lure wanna-be stars to their program. These two schools may both be rich in tradition and long time powerhouse programs, but they could not be more different. Pete Carroll (up there with the likes of Steinbrenner for people I can't stand) is a great recruiter, but an extremely overrated coach. That team shouldn't lose games. Not to Oregon State, not to Stanford, not even to Texas in the 2005 National Championship. There are no excuses. Everyone keeps talking about how Carroll will have his boys ready for this game, but it was he who was the first to publicly state that USC didn't deserve to go to the Rose Bowl. Arrogance can be a terrible thing, and I know every member of the blue and white wants to shove it down Carroll's throat. If anyone is going to be ready, it's going to be the Nittany Lions.

Flashback to 2005. Pete Carroll (supposedly amazing at preparing his teams for big games) goes for it on fourth down with 2:05 left. They were on the Texas 45 yard line and winning 38-33. If they got the first, the game would likely be over, but if not, and this is what happened, Texas gets the ball with some momentum at midfield and can go on and win the game. Why not force Texas to go ~90 yards to beat you? Obviously the call to go for it was no mystery. That's how Carroll coaches. He's confident in his offense, but sometimes to the point of arrogance. His cocky attitude surely must light a fire under someone as humble as Joe Paterno. There are coaches out there that JoePa truly likes and respects, but two of those who are not on that list are Pete Carroll and Charlie Weis, and because of that, I really feel that Joe is even more motivated to show up Carroll and let him know not to disrespect Penn State. It will be a tough game to win, I know that much. USC has unreal athletes, but the both teams have defenses that should be able to keep this tight. Pete, I actually feel very confident in Rubin and the rest of the secondary, and even at linebacker Hull has progressed very well. I expect for Penn State to use Mauti a little more however because of his speed possibly on third down situations. I have complete faith in the game planning of PSU with a month of time to get ready. Should be dandy, and I can't even put in to words what a win over USC would mean to me. More to come later.