Halfway to Perfection

Okay, so it wasn't pretty on Saturday. And all that talk of the offense being unstoppable and Jay Paterno looking like Norm Chow was probably a bit premature - but Penn State is 6-0 and still in great position to get a shot at the National Title if it can win out the rest of the year.

Still, things weren't quite as bad as they seemed. Penn State did manage to open up a three-score lead on the road and held Purdue, who has the top-ranked passing attack in the league, to just six points, by far its lowest scoring output of the season. Those fans hoping to see the Spread HD light up the Ross-Ade stadium scoreboard were surely disappointed, but there's a difference between missed opportunities and being stopped.

Consider that Penn State only had eight offensive possessions on Saturday (if you don't count the last possession when Penn State simply let the clock run down to zero after picking up four first downs) and still racked up 422 yards. That's an average of 6.4 yards per play and half of the possessions resulted in scores. Also realize that only once in those eight times did Penn State fail to pick up at least 30 yards before either scoring or having to punt.

Probably the aspect that was most concerning about the offense's lowest point total of the year was the failure to convert third downs. Penn State is ranked eighth in the nation, turning 52.7% of its third downs into first downs, but was only 4-of-12 on Saturday. The Lions' first two drives of the day both stalled after they couldn't move the chains on a third and one. Each time, Penn State tried to plunge Evan Royster into the line and was unsuccessful.

From my observations, it seemed that Purdue did what other teams will likely do against the Lions for the rest of this season. Namely, elect the "slow death option" against Penn State's offense. That is to say that the Boilermakers were content to play a deep zone and force Penn State to move the ball down the field without the aid of a big play. In fact, Penn State had only two passing plays of 20+ yards against Purdue despite quarterback Daryll Clark setting a new career high in passing yards (220).

If teams try to do this, it's good to know that Royster can quickly make them reconsider by keeping up his eye-popping average of 7.8 yards per carry. Moreover, don't forget that Clark was without his favorite target, Jordan Norwood, for the second straight week. Norwood typically can be found slicing through the soft middle of a zone defense like the one Purdue employed on Saturday, and will be invaluable should other teams also take away the deep ball.

Of course, complaining about a Big Ten road victory that improved the overall season record to 6-0 is nittpicking to say the least. Next week's game against Wisconsin has been shifted from ABC to ESPN, but Wisconsin is reeling after two straight heart-breaking losses and I still think will prove to be the Lions toughest test thus far.

More on the game later these were just things I fell asleep thinking about on Saturday. I think six weeks was long enough to ignore the defense - so we'll take a look at that unit soon. Also, it's time we stop talking about Penn State as if it exists within a vaccuum and start making meniton of the other teams in the top 10 and all the big matchups that are going on this weekend.