| Hey USC, is this your King? James Franklin can certainly recruit, but his in game coaching is under scrutiny yet again, with some extremely questionable play calling in a home loss to Michigan last week. While Penn State's record is a little confusing, if you just write Illinois off as an anomaly, it actually makes a lot of sense. They have a really good secondary, and are a second tier conference team, as is everyone not named Wisconsin, so they are going to be in a lot of close one possession games. Rutgers? Yeah, good luck there. Looked good through a 3-1 start, with the one loss being a one score game on the road at Michigan. But then they got thumped by Ohio State and Michigan State, and mustered just 7 points in a loss to Northwestern. OK, so they are back to being Rutgers...except they turn around and win in Champaign against an Illinois team that had just won in Happy Valley. OK, maybe Schiano still has something here, and they look absolutely inept, in losing 52-3 to Wisconsin. And rebound last week to beat Indiana 38-3, their largest margin of victory since joining the Big Ten, and their largest win over a Power 5/BCS opponent since a 63-14 win over Louisville in 2008. The Scarlet Knights have played better on the road all season, beating Syracuse, Illinois and Indiana, with the close loss to Michigan. The 21-7 game at Northwestern is their only bad game away from Piscataway. It's the home games, where they haven't beaten an FBS team since Temple in the opener, where they've struggled. The Nittany Lions defense is going to show up, it has all year, even as they've lost 4 of 5. They need just enough offense. They've only lost one game all year when tallying at least 372 yards, and have not just won, but covered in all 5 of those games. Rutgers is giving up 420.6 ypg on a Big Ten worst 6.4 ypp. It's a lot of feast or famine. They held Michigan, Illinois and Indiana to under 370 yards, but Michigan State, Ohio State and Wisconsin all put up over 500. I think with Rutgers' defense you'll know early. If Penn State moves the ball early, that's usually a good sign that it will continue to all day. |