Favorite Penn State Bowl Game?
- Thread starter psu skp
- Start date
Can't beat the 1969 Orange Bowl. I was there and ran on the field after the win. I remember jumping up and down on the field with the backup Penn State tight end. I think his name was Tim Horst. About 5 of us then drove non-stop from Miami to State College in a beatup old Chrysler. We had to keep stopping to dump a can of oil into it. It was a memorable time.
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As I understood more about college football over the years and came to really appreciate what JVP accomplished - and what a great coach he was - the more I became convinced that giving a great coach a month to prepare for an important game meant that what you might expect to see play out if it was a regular season game might not happen. JVP had a month to prep for Texas, and he figured out how to stop the wishbone. (If I recall, it was by flowing to the run and forcing it wide with numbers on the D side).
The 2005 season Orange Bowl was a great example. I recall telling my buddies that FSU scared me because Bobby Bowden had a month to prepare and get his team better. They had talent, they had a mediocre season for them. PSU was already an great team and did not have a lot of room to get a lot better. So while PSU was the better team by far (imo) and if they had played with 1 week to prepare, I think PSU would have won by two TDs. But Bowden had a month to get ready, and it showed. They played us even for the most part, and then the better team prevailed but not without some very anxious moments along the way! Our better players needed to step up, and when we had a couple of key injuries early in the game, Some talented backups needed to come in and play well - Austin Scott for Tony Hunt and Sean Lee for Poz.
Foster Grose.....the official who patted himself on the back so hard he sprained his shoulder (even though he had blatantly "missed" Kansas' participation with 12 men for four straight plays):
Was later hired as an "Officiating Instructor" by the B1G (under Delany's immediate predecessor - James Duke) .........and served as the God-Father to Jim Delany's 1st child - - - - Newman McMurray Delany.
Grose was widely credited with establishing the first "conference-wide" system of officiating evaluations and advancement.
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Guess my honorable mention pick would be the 1980 Fiesta Bowl.
Penn State vs Ohio State Buckeyes, OSU leads us 19-7 before halftime. We drive down the field and kick a FG right before the half. We then make some halftime adjustments and win 31-19 (outscoring them 21-0 in the 2nd half).
Sounds like this season right? Of course, our offense wasn't the run & gun, more like the "stand and hand".
Penn State vs Ohio State Buckeyes, OSU leads us 19-7 before halftime. We drive down the field and kick a FG right before the half. We then make some halftime adjustments and win 31-19 (outscoring them 21-0 in the 2nd half).
Sounds like this season right? Of course, our offense wasn't the run & gun, more like the "stand and hand".
"I'm dying."Thanks for the kind words. As for getting lucky, I have a couple of good lines but decorum prevents me from using them here.
"What's wrong?"
"My heart is melting."
Scottie told me that Theismann was pronounced Theezman in the pre Heisman days. I met Joe's dad in FL back in the late 80s and told him what Scottie had said (I'm so tactful haha). Mr. Theismann denied it, said his name was always pronounced Thizeman. Whatever. Ask wifey if she knows though she's likely too young if '78 is your grad year (unless wifey was a cougar ahead of her time
).
"I'm dying."
"What's wrong?"
"My heart is melting."
Scottie told me that Theismann was pronounced Theezman in the pre Heisman days. I met Joe's dad in FL back in the late 80s and told him what Scottie had said (I'm so tactful haha). Mr. Theismann denied it, said his name was always pronounced Thizeman. Whatever. Ask wifey if she knows though she's likely too young if '78 is your grad year (unless wifey was a cougar ahead of her time
I'd have to recheck with her, but I think she knew Pearson's younger brother, but did not know Theismann or Scott. Her SRHS grad year was '73, and she remains friends with a number of those folks, including Joe Susan, now the head coach at Bucknell, when they meet up at HS reunions.
I knew other people from SRHS, and they all said that it was Theezman back then. The story was that Roger Valdesari (I think), the SID at ND back then, changed it to generate publicity around Joe being a candidate for the Heisman. Not a bad idea for back then.
Side story - when I was in 8th grade, we had a writing assignment focusing on something or other. I think we could choose the topic. I was an avid Sports Illustrated reader, and I knew my teacher was probably not, so I largely plagiarized a story in SI about Theismann, changing the names, changing a few things here or there, but mostly taking entire chunks of phrases and sentences for my own use - especially anything that struck me as clever or funny. (I did not understand all the ethical aspects of such a thing back then!)
Anyway, I thought the story I wrote was great, turned it in, expecting an 'A'. How could I not get an A? It's basically written by a professional!
Got a C. Lack of clarity in the story or some such explanation. A 'C' for me in 8th grade English was not the norm. I was so tempted to go to the teacher and say.... 'But I took it right out of Sports Illustrated! How can you give it a C?!' Even with my limited common sense at the time, I opted to not do that. But basically my 8th grade English teacher gave a C to whoever wrote that SI story about Theismann. Maybe she was ahead of her time!
Had not thought about that in a long, long time. Funny how references in these message boards can stir up old memories. Old, old memories.
When I was a junior at PSU, NBC did one of their anniversary retrospectives (may have been 50 years--may have been 75 years). This was the game chosen to represent their football coverage--I could hear "The Nittany Lion" being played as the intro to the piece.
That's one of mine. And the 1995 Rose Bowl, as that's the only PSU bowl game I've been to.
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