Happy Valley Rewind: Penn State-Illinois 1994

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We’re traveling back to 1994 for the latest edition of our bi-weekly offseason series over on our YouTube channel (please subscribe, you haven’t already done so), as we cover arguably the greatest comeback in program history where Penn State rallied from a 21-0 deficit at Illinois to clinch a Rose Bowl berth and preserve their undefeated season. One of us may have even gotten a little carried away when it came to dressing up as a mid-90’s PSU student.

Once again, here’s a reminder of the categories we’ll be covering:

State of The Program Going Into The Game: What was Penn State as a program at this time? What were the vibes like? Fans happy? Hopeful? Set the stage for the game as diehards who lived it.

Most Rewatchable Play: Talk about a few different plays that stick out. These are “impressive” plays not necessarily the most “pivotal” — which is its own category.

Mandela Effect: Is there a specific moment or play from that game that on the rewatch provides context to a moment we maybe misremember?

Biggest Gaffe: Clock management at some point? A bad decision on third down? Stupid throw? THE BIASED BIG TEN REFS?!

The Yaacov Yisrael “Hey, Remember That Guy”: Who was a random Penn Stater in the game you haven’t thought about in a long time?

Man, It’d Be Nice To Have This Guy: Player in the game who would be most helpful on the current Penn State team?

Pivotal Moment: Plays that swung the game or decided it, specifically later in the game.

Apex Mountain Performance: Was there anyone who had a ball out performance? Maybe the game was the “peak” performance for the team as a whole? Or a coach for the entire tenure? Or the program for the decade? Think big picture with this, though this can always come back to who had the best game.

Rewatchability Ranking: Scale of 1-10, 1 being abhorrent and 5 being fun, how fun is this game as a rewatch?

What We Wish We Knew Then: Basically, what was the impact of this end result? If your current self could travel back in time and explain the fall out of this game, what would you say? Think of it as a sliding doors moment, too.

Also, here’s the video we used as our main reference if you want to watch beforehand:

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