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On a picturesque Friday morning in late July, fifth-year senior quarterback Sean Clifford stepped out of his cart and onto the fourth tee box at a State College-area golf course.
His hair shaggy and shirt untucked, Clifford was the picture of relaxation. With the beginning of Penn State’s 2021 season still more than six weeks away and the nightmare of the team’s 2020 performance long dead and gone, he found himself free to enjoy a moment of respite.
Playing by himself that day, he was in a world that was unique and yet also somehow remarkably familiar.
As the course lazily came alive in the first hours of daylight, maintenance crews easily outnumbering golfers, Clifford found himself alone and unbothered by anything more than a missed putt or errant tee shot. It was a brief window of literal isolation, the kind of moment he isn’t likely to experience very often in the coming months as he prepares for his third season as the starting quarterback for one of the nation’s most storied college football programs.
But on the heels of a miserable junior season in which Clifford struggled throughout the team’s 0-5 start and was benched briefly due to an avalanche of turnovers, the figurative feeling of isolation isn’t completely foreign. The pressures that inevitably come with the job were exacerbated last season by the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, and that experience has left Clifford with an understanding of how it feels to be on a big stage, alone in the spotlight.
“You don’t really, truly learn until you experience it yourself. And it's definitely a lot. It’s a lot on your mind, it’s a lot on your physical [well-being],” Clifford said. “There’s a lot more than just throwing a ball. And I think that was something that I had to learn and grow through in 2019. Then in 2020, I think that was magnified because I needed to weather the storm, not only within the team, but I had to weather it within myself.
“There’s no inch of my body that would ever want to lose five games. That’s just not how I’m wired. I’m an extremely competitive person, and the last thing I want to do is lose for my team, for my coaches, and then for the fan base. It’s just a brutal thing to go through.”
For Clifford, there was no bottom to last year’s misery.
Although he managed to hit 60.5 percent of his passes, improving his completion percentage by two points from the previous year and throwing for 1,883 yards and 16 touchdowns, the turnovers — he tied for the Big Ten high with nine interceptions — proved devastating. Clifford connected on 68.6 percent of his attempts in the late-October opener at Indiana, throwing for three touchdowns and rushing for another, but his two picks proved costly.
From there, the situation got progressively worse for Clifford and the team. The Nittany Lions lost consecutive games to Ohio State and Maryland at home, then fell at Nebraska, a game in which Clifford was pulled before the end of the first half following an interception and fumble. They lost again to visiting Iowa after a pick-six by the Hawkeyes thwarted their second-half comeback bid. All told, Clifford threw eight interceptions in that five-game span while completing only 48.3 percent of his pass attempts for 1,070 yards and 11 touchdowns.
Equally demoralizing to a Penn State offense that had entered the season with high expectations, the absences of then-junior Journey Brown and then-sophomore Noah Cain at running back left Clifford as the Nittany Lions’ primary ball carrier. He racked up 52 rushing attempts in the first three games, netting 150 yards and a touchdown.
But Clifford was able to turn his season around, throwing just one more interception in the team’s final four games while completing 65.6 percent of his attempts. More important, he led the Nittany Lions to four wins. In the process, he regained the trust and confidence of head coach James Franklin and his teammates heading into a critical offseason.
While the Lions may have finished strong, they suffered their first losing season since 2004. That was enough to prompt a major staff change, with Kirk Ciarrocca departing after just one season as offensive coordinator to make way for Mike Yurcich.
Elsewhere, it was the returnees who made news. At the receiver position, All-Big Ten senior Jahan Dotson was persuaded to come back for one more season rather than leave early for the NFL. The Nittany Lions’ offense also features a pair of promising tackles in redshirt junior Rasheed Walker and redshirt sophomore Caedan Wallace, with senior interior lineman Mike Miranda shifting to center under the direction of assistant coach Phil Trautwein.
Returning from injury, Cain is part of a stable of running backs that make up one of the nation’s better backfields top-to-bottom. And the tight end position also looks strong, with sophomores Brenton Strange and Theo Johnson both having gained experience after Pat Freiermuth suffered a season-ending injury last year.
So, the table is set and arranged for Penn State’s turnaround, and its offensive changes are a primary component of that plan. The coaching staff and roster have been assembled with an eye toward producing offensive numbers akin to the 2016 and ’17 seasons. Whether the Lions are able to do that will depend heavily on having a confident, competent, productive Sean Clifford at quarterback.
James Franklin is hopeful, noting that Clifford has learned a lot in his two previous starting seasons at Penn State.
“He’s been through a number of systems now,” Franklin said. “He’s had a lot of success. People forget, [at this time last year] we were talking about Sean as maybe one of the better quarterbacks in college football and arguably the best quarterback in the Big Ten or part of that conversation at least. He’s still that guy. I’m a huge believer in Sean.
“Last year was extremely painful for him, but I think there’s growth that is going to come from that, especially when it comes to some of the toughness aspects. There’s emotional toughness that comes from going through a year like that, mental toughness that comes from going through a year like that, especially when you had so many people patting you on the back the year before.”
Surrounded by a community of teammates and coaches who are determined to lift him up ahead of the 2021 season, Clifford sees the situation much the same way.
Following the offseason transfer of backup Will Levis, the starting spot and leadership role are assuredly Clifford’s with the first game at Wisconsin on Sept. 4 quickly approaching. He’s been narrowing his focus as he looks to make the kind of gradual, incremental improvements that lead to success, and in the process he’s shed the distractions and baggage of the past.
“It definitely toughened me up. It definitely thickened my skin, where now I realize that wherever we are this season — and I’m very confident that we’re going to be at the top again — that won’t matter to me this year,” Clifford said. “I'll be on the same mission, day in and day out until the year is over, and then I can finally reflect back on everything that happened.
“So, if we’re number one in the country this year, it won’t be any different than if we were last in the country, because the approach doesn’t change. It doesn’t matter what happened the week before. I still need to perform this week in order to get the job done.”
He’s been afforded every opportunity and resource at the program’s disposal this offseason. Now it’s a job to be filled by Clifford alone.
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