The Penn State Football Show

Lions and Tigers and....Bears! Oh my! What Bears you ask? The Bruins! Unfortunately I will be unable to view the Capital One Bowl live since I will be attending the Winter Classic hockey game at Fenway Park, but Drew and I (and Fitz) will attempt to do the impossible....record the game and watch it from start to finish as if it were live. To do this, we will be incommunicado from 1pm until we have seen the final play of the Penn State - LSU matchup.

Now on to the game itself! I am really looking forward to this defensive duel, and the opportunity for Penn State to finally earn the evasive meaningful victory. So far this season Penn State has taken care of business in their wins and in their losses they have made mistakes and not been able to run the ball. LSU presents a stingy defense that held Florida to only 13 points, and we have come to expect a solid defensive unit out of the bayou on a yearly basis. This year however, the defense has been giving up more yards (both passing and rushing) than their own offense can produce. Their defense has 20 sacks (not a bad number) but they have allowed 35! In a game against lowly Louisiana Tech, LSU managed only 246 yards while giving up 322 after squeaking out an ugly 8 point victory. All season LSU has failed to live up to their billing.

All in all I have not been impressed with LSU all season. They, like Penn State, have not beaten a currently ranked team, and I feel that much of their legitimacy is due to the fact that they "hung in there" against Florida and Alabama. In both of those games, however, their yardage was doubled by their opponent. In addition, for the bowl game, LSU's top running back, Charles Scott, will not play due to an injury....too bad. Even without him in the lineup, all month I have heard about "Southern Speed" yada yada yada. Everyone's got their blazers, and Penn State is no different. What's so damn special about LSU? Oh my god they have someone on their team that runs a 10 second 100-meter! Terrifying! Too bad the chump only has 23 carries and 3 catches on the season. Yet all month that is all I heard. "LSU is too fast"...."this Holliday kid is going to outrun the Penn State defense". Horsehockey. I love Devon Smith, but the little guy has been a non-factor over the course of the season. Sure he's as fast as chihuahua falling down a manhole, but he isn't a great football player. Neither is Holliday...he's just fast. Put it back in your pants media types! He concerns me on kickoffs and that's about it. People don't realize the speed of Penn State's defense. AJ Wallace, Bowman, Lee, and Crawford are all guys that have above average speed for their positions. There are also rumors that we may see a fair amount of the fleet of foot Gerald Hodges at linebacker. LSU simply put has not been able to do much offensively all season while Penn State's defense has been smothering. Put that together and LSU is going to have a tough time moving the ball.

Their inability to sustain drives on offense has hurt their defense, and this is not the same kind of LSU defense we have seen in the past. Typically their defensive line is full of monsters, but this year the stars of the defense have probably been the secondary and LB's. Look for Penn State to really try to establish the running game and make a statement on the line. The Lions have a number of guys that can produce offensively, and with a whole month of focused practice, I fully expect guys like Curtis Drake to play a major role in the game. All in all, Penn State seems much more talented and they possess greater depth than the Tigers. Keep LaFell (LSU's star WR) double covered and stuff the run and LSU can't do much else.

With all this being said, you can't count out LSU. They are well coached and play well in bowl games. Only a few years ago they were national champions, and last year they diagnosed Georgia Tech's triple option and absolutely dominated the game, but in my opinion, it will be quite tough to prepare for Penn State. They are well balanced, disciplined, and perform well in bowl games. The coaches have proved in the past several years that they are not afraid to throw in some new wrinkles during bowl preparation, and even if they don't throw any gimmicks at LSU, the threat of one will constantly be on their mind when guys like Drake, Smith, and Newsome are in the game. Over the past four years, Penn State has performed at a high level offensively and they have execute well, even against some very stout defenses.

I am clearly biased, but LSU has underachieved all year and have been sloppy in most of their games. The same could be said of Penn State, but with the way they came out and executed against Michigan State, I tend to forget about their slop. Florida held LSU to 162 yards of offense. Penn State has a better defense, and as long as Clark can minimize errors, I see LSU gaining well under 300 yards and scoring at most one touchdown. The biggest danger for Penn State, and an area LSU will undoubtedly target, is special teams. With a whole month to get healthy and work on their kick coverage though, I expect PSU has addressed this. With how poorly LSU's offense has played, it wouldn't be a bad idea to just kick to an up-man every kickoff to get the ball out of Hollidays little mitts. This is a big test and a very meaningful game for the university and the Big Ten as a whole. I was very pleased with Wisconsin's win over Miami, and hopefully, with the exception of the damn Hawkeyes, the trend can continue.

Mufasa takes down Shere Khan.

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