The gnashing of teeth has just begun.
Riding a wave of second half wave of come to Jesus moments of late, Penn State rolled up another one against Michigan State that turned a 12-10 halftime deficit into a 45-12 rout, sending them to Indianapolis for a Big Ten Championship game that could make for some sleepless night for the CFB Playoff committee.
Thus continues a highly improbable run that has come on the heels of second half outbursts. Someone should see what James Franklin is feeding these fellas at halftime.
PSU scored on their first three drives out of the halftime gate, coming a week after they were up 9-0 against moribund Rutgers and outscored them in the second half 30-0. And that came after outscoring Indiana 31-17 in the second half in a 14-point win.
All of that came two weeks after outscoring Purdue 45-7 in the second half after being tied at the break. In other words, watch what you say at halftime, Wisconsin.
Trace McSorley threw for three scores in the third quarter alone, and then the defense mostly just overwhelmed the Spartan front the rest of the game. The details aren’t overly exciting, but the possibilities from here surely are.
If Penn State rolls into Indy and defeats Wisconsin, prevailing theory is that they’re in. But if so, who is out? It’ll be one of potentially a one-loss Pac-12 champ in Washington or Ohio State, who tied PSU for the division title and has racked up three top 10 wins on the way to a 1-loss season.
If if’s were fifths, we’d all be drunk, but we’re rapidly approaching the point where any clean finish to this playoff selection thing is looking unattainable.
It’s somewhat hard to fathom that PSU got here after losing to Pitt and getting put on the grill and smoked by Michigan. It’s a testament to not giving up when things are looking a little dark and staying the course. To date, PSU has the most earth shattering win this season, over Ohio State at home. So many fortunes changed on that one game.
So the fact PSU has any shot at a playoff berth is shocking if you’d have been talking about it two months ago, and it’s come on the backs of McSorley (376 yards and 4 touchdowns today), Saquon Barkley (who will be monitored after leaving with an injury), and Chris Godwin (135 receiving yards and 2 touchdowns).
While all of the talk coming into the Big Ten season was Jim Harbaugh and Urban Meyer (reasonably so) and whether or not Mark Dantonio and Michigan State could stay where they’ve become comfortable at the top of the Big Ten, James Franklin and PSU snuck in the back door and stole a 6-pack from everyone’s fridge.
It’s Penn State … none of those aforementioned teams … that will have the biggest say in who represents the Big Ten in the CFB Playoff, and they may be the key to affecting the fortunes of even more teams.
Stay tuned, but because the Nittany Lions turned it around, we’re about to find out a good, healthy amount about what the CFB Playoff thinks of a variety of things, out of conference record versus conference championships, division championships, conference championships from “tougher” conferences over others, and so on.
Credit PSU for making it happen, though, and with one more big win in Indianapolis, PSU’s dream season could take it on a cloud to playoff-land.
