Penn State vs. Northwestern: Four Keys to Victory

Penn State vs. Northwestern faces off in a rare primetime matchup on Friday night. The Nittany Lions will look to bounce back after last week’s 24-20 defeat to Wisconsin.

The loss was ugly. The offense struggled to move the ball, and the defense collapsed in the fourth quarter. It was uncharacteristic of a Penn State team to experience both in the same game.

Friday presents an opportunity for the Nittany Lions to get right against a tough Northwestern squad. The Wildcats nearly pulled off an upset over No. 5 Indiana last Friday, but came up short 29-23.

Penn State’s College Football Playoff hopes are on the line in Evanston. Here are four keys to keeping the Nittany Lions’ season on the rails.

Penn State’s offense was flat-out bad last week against Wisconsin. Taylor Mouser’s unit totaled just 248 yards in 65 plays, went three-and-out four times in the fourth quarter, and punted seven times in 13 drives.

Rocco Becht was off the mark, too. He completed 41% of his passes for 129 yards and an interception. Chase Sowell was also the only wide receiver to catch the ball.

Penn State will lose to Northwestern if the offense has a similar performance. However, the Wildcats do not present nearly as much of a challenge defensively as Wisconsin did.

The Badgers’ defense ranked in the upper half of the FBS in scoring, passing, and total defense. Northwestern’s defense enters this game ranking in the bottom half of the country in passing, rushing, and total defense.

The Wildcats’ pass rush has also been nonexistent so far. They have only five sacks (tied-107th in FBS) and 11 tackles for loss (tied-133rd).

If Penn State’s offense can just be competent, scoring 30-plus points is a legitimate possibility.

This extends the previous point. Penn State’s offense has scored on only 80% of its red zone trips, which is unimpressive given the schedule the Nittany Lions have played. Third down isn’t eye-popping either, converting just 41% of the time.

Both Penn State’s red zone and third-down conversion rates rank in the bottom 60 of teams.

“I’m frustrated with that, and it’s an ongoing thing,” offensive coordinator Taylor Mouser said on Tuesday.

Whether it’s play calling, personnel, alignment, or execution, Penn State must capitalize inside the 20-yard line.

Penn State has been successful at containing scrambling quarterbacks so far. Wisconsin’s Colton Joseph rushed 13 times for only 39 yards, but did score a touchdown last week. He was also pressured 14 times, according to Pro Football Focus, but was sacked just once. That last number is the key here.

While Penn State has pressured these scrambling quarterbacks and kept them relatively well-contained, the pass rush hasn’t forced many big losses yet.

Sacks are drive killers. Letting Aidan Chiles hang in the backfield spells trouble for Penn State’s secondary. Chiles has proven he’s an accurate passer, completing 70% of his throws this season with no interceptions. While Chiles isn’t the same pure runner as Joseph, he’s still capable of extending plays with his feet and hitting targets downfield.

Campbell’s first Big Ten conference game clearly didn’t go as planned, and some coaching decisions contributed to the loss.

Campbell fielded multiple questions this week about second-guessing a fourth-and-one decision in the fourth quarter after a TV timeout. Penn State also ran the ball five times on third-and-6 or longer to play the field-position battle, rather than trying to make a big play.

“You’re playing with such a lead early on that you don’t want to screw it up,” Campbell said. “You’re playing such great defense, and you’re putting yourself in such a great situation that you felt like the flow of the game, the turnovers, you just wanted to keep playing field position a little bit and continue to put yourself in a great situation.”

Penn State also chose to run out the clock on the final drive of the first half after an illegal formation penalty instead of trying to extend its 17-7 lead with three timeouts.

“I felt like we were playing such good defense there that I just didn’t want to put our team at risk. That’ll eat at me,” Campbell said in the postgame press conference. “The other thing is, they had two timeouts, and I didn’t want to give them the ball back there either at the end of the half. When it started negative, I just felt like the biggest thing for us was, ‘Let’s get this thing into halftime.'”

Campbell experienced firsthand the results of coaching too passively in the Big Ten. Last week should’ve been a wake-up call. It’s time to coach more aggressively, even if his team is up by three scores.

Main Photo: Matthew O’Haren-Imagn Images