Penn State fails to seize opportunity against Ohio State

STATE COLLEGE - The high point of Penn State's day on Saturday came 33 minutes before the 11th-ranked Nittany Lions kicked off to No. 15 Ohio State in a pivotal Big Ten Conference game in Beaver Stadium.

It was 3:02 p.m. when the clock expired on fourth-ranked Iowa in a shocking loss to Northwestern. That opened wide a window of opportunity for coach Joe Paterno's Nits to not only snag a possible undisputed league title, or at least a share of it, but to position themselves for a return trip to the Rose Bowl or even to shorten their long-shot odds for a berth in the BCS national-championship game. The public-address announcement of the Iowa loss was made at 3:16, resulting in an eruption of cheers from a sellout crowd of 110,033 that understood the ramifications of what had just gone down in Iowa City.

As it turned out, even more dominoes tumbled during the course of another day fraught with surprise outcomes and perilous escapes in college football's increasingly unstable environment.

All Penn State had to do was take care of business against the Buckeyes and it would have taken a large stride forward in the rankings as well as quieting skeptics who have been saying all along that its schedule was pillow-soft, therefore its credentials for national recognition were suspect. Ohio State was the first ranked team the Nits have played all year during the week of the game, and that won't change this Saturday in the home finale against Indiana and through the regular-season curtain-closer on Nov. 21 at Michigan State.

So the question for the moment is whether Ohio State's thoroughly dominant 24-7 victory over the home team actually is an upset, or an affirmation that maybe the Nits really aren't as good as advertised?

"They gave us a good licking," Penn State coach Joe Paterno admitted. "They played better than we did today."

That was especially so in an area - special teams - that has constituted an Achilles' heel for the Nits (8-2, 4-2) all year. Early in the first quarter Ohio State punter Jon Thoma got off a 55-yard punt to pin Penn State back at its own 15-yard line, and after a three-and-out Nits punter Jeremy Boone's 37-yard punt was returned 41 yards by Ray Small to the Nits' 9. Two plays later, quarterback Terrelle Pryor ran through a Navorro Bowman arm tackle to score from 7 yards out and give the Buckeyes (8-2, 5-1) a 7-0 lead after an elapsed time of only 3 minutes, 13 seconds.