30 Thoughts, stats, & notes on Penn State Football's 30-0 win over Maryland
Penn State dominated for all four quarters on Saturday afternoon at Beaver Stadium, taking down the Maryland Terrapins 30-0 in front of a strong Beaver Stadium crowd. Below, I give 30 thoughts, stats, and notes on the Nittany Lions' eighth win of the season.
1. Penn State is now 41-3-1 against Maryland all-time. Since 2015, the Nittany Lions have won seven of eight including six five wins by double-digits. In four of those games, Penn State has allowed three points or less while in total, outscoring Maryland 312-99.
2. In their eight wins this season, Penn State has outscored opponents 292-105, an average score of 36.5 to 13.1.
3. Saturday's game was the 8th time that Penn State has shut out an opponent since 2014. That is the fifth most in college football over that time period with only Alabama, Georgia, Wisconsin, and Clemson ahead of the Nittany Lions.
It was the 25th time they kept an opponent to seven points or less and the 31st time they've kept an opponent to 10 points or less. Good enough to make the top 10 in both categories.
4. Sean Clifford broke the program record for passing yards in a career in the first quarter on Saturday, surpassing Trace McSorley's 8,899 career passing yards. Clifford would later become the first Penn State quarterback to surpass 10,000 yards in his career, the sixth Big Ten quarterback to ever do so.
5. That being said, it wasn't Clifford's best day. He was just 12-for-23 on the day for 139 yards and one touchdown. He had several missed opportunities including two overthrows that would've resulted in touchdowns.
6. Luckily for Clifford, the Nittany Lions really didn't need him to be anywhere close to perfect on Saturday. Against a Maryland rushing attack that has been mostly solid this season, the Nittany Lions ran for 249 yards on 43 carries, an average of 5.8 yards per carry.
7. Nick Singleton ran like we haven't seen him do thus far in his career. It looked like everything has begun to click for the Shillington (PA) native, he failed to get tripped up as he would in the past and consistently ran strong through would-be tacklers. He had 122 rushing yards in the game on just 11 carries.
8. The T-Formation on third and shorts and fourth and shorts this season hasn't always worked. But it surely did on Saturday as both of Nick Singleton's touchdowns came from the T-Formation. On his first touchdown, Singleton hit the open hole on the right side of th line hard, exploding into the open field and taking it 45-yards for the score. In the second quarter, once again out of the T-Formation, he would have a "grown man" touchdown, having to have a little bit more fight to get through the line before carrying a would-be tackler into the endzone for a 27-yard touchdown.
9. Kaytron Allen has been the star of the backfield for most of the last few weeks and while he didn't have the long runs that Singleton had, he still had another quality performance. He totaled 73 yards over 16 carries in the game, an average of 4.6 yards per carry.
10. Now through 10 games, Penn State's star running back duo has produced to the tune of 1,620 yards from scrimmage and 19 touchdowns this season.
11. It was a quiet day overall for Penn State's passing offense, the weather not being of assistance to the Nittany Lions' signal callers. The Nittany Lions' quarterbacks were a combined 16-for-30 for 164 yards and one touchdown. True freshman Drew Allar was 3-for-6 for 18 yards while third-string quarterback Christian Veilleux was 1-for-1 for seven yards.
12. The tight ends, however, as Theo Jonson, Brenton Strange, and Khalil Dinkins combined for seven receptions for 79 yards. Overall, 12 different Nittany Lions recorded receptions in the win. The tight ends also had major blocks in both of Nick Singleton's touchdowns.
13. The Nittany Lions' offensive line despite missing Olu Fashanu and Landon Tengwall still performed extremely well. As we've mentioned, the Nittany Lions dominated on the ground with 249 rushing yards and 5.8 yards per attempt. But also kept their quarterbacks off the ground and didn't allow many pressures overall. Maryland's defense had just three quarterback hurries but recorded no sacks.
14. Drew Shelton for a second straight game was impressive for a true freshman. He allowed just one pressure on his 34 pass-blocking opportunities. Juice Scruggs and Bryce Effner were both superb as well. Effner's development this season has been impressive.
15. It wasn't Penn State's best day on third down, converting just 5-of-15 attempts but they were 2-for-2 on fourth downs with those two plays resulting in 72 yards and two touchdowns.
16. Defensively, it's safe to say it was a fantastic day for Manny Diaz's unit. The Nittany Lions kept the Terrapins to just 134 total yards with 74 yards allowed through the air and 60 yards allowed on the ground. This was all of course without CB Joey Porter Jr. or LB Curtis Jacobs.
17. The Nittany Lions' defensive line has been solid in getting into the backfield all season but in the last two weeks they've taken their game to the next level and have been finishing those pass rushes off. After six sacks against Indiana, the Nittany Lions' sacked the Terrapins quarterbacks seven times in the game.
18. There was simply no way Chop Robinson was going to be kept quiet against his former program and he wasn't. He had three tackles in the game including two sacks.
19. Abdul Carter, Adisa Isaac, Zane Durant, Amin Vanover, and Ji'Ayir Brown all recorded sacks as well.
20. The Nittany Lions in the game also recorded nine tackles for a loss.
21. Abdul Carter continues to shine week in and week out. Against Maryland, he recorded seven tackles including three solo tackles, one sack, one tackle for a loss, one pass breakup, two additional quarterback hits, and one forced fumble. We simply shouldn't be surprised by anything he does at this point. He's second on the team with 44 tackles, tied for third with 5.5 tackles for a loss, and second in sacks with 3.5.
22. Quite a few young guys flashed when on the field including S Kevin Winston Jr and DT Zane Durant.
23. Other players who I thought had strong games and deserve to be noted include CB Kalen King, S Ji'Ayir Brown, DT Hakeem Beamon, DT Dvon Ellies, and LB Jonathan Sutherland.
24. Lastly defensive specific note is, it was great to see Zuriah Fisher out there late in the game. He was thought to be lost for the season when he went down with an injury in the offseason but has clearly rehabbed and worked his way back ahead of schedule. He played six snaps against the Terrapins.
25. In the game the Nittany Lions allowed just four plays of 10+ yards. Those four plays accounted for 57 of Maryland's 134 total yards.
26. I do think that James Franklin and his staff probably missed an opportunity to get Drew Allar more time on Saturday. The game was clearly over by halftime with how the defense was performing and going two drives in the second half with Clifford wasn't shocking. You always risk a slightly longer drive such as Maryland's 12-play drive for 37 yards mid-way through the third quarter taking a notable chunk of time and snaps away from the younger players. Either way, in weather such as Saturdays, they were never going to let Allar throw the ball a ton, which makes it a slightly moot point.
27. Outside of Allar's playing time, I thought the coaching staff did a solid job at getting younger players in and out of the game throughout the win.
28. Jake Pinegar has been automatic since September. He's made eight straight kicks and is now 11-for-13 on the season.
29. It was not Barney Amor's best day but freshman punter Alex Bacchetta looks like he'll fill in just nice next season as the Nittany Lions' starting punter. Both of his punts were perfectly placed inside Maryland's 20-yard line.
30. Penn State will take on Rutgers next Saturday afternoon at 3:30 p.m. in Piscataway. The Nittany Lions shut out the Scarlet Knights last season 28-0.
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