Andrew Quarless

Sophomore tight end Andrew Quarless and backup defensive back Willie Harriott will miss the next three to four weeks as a punishment for underage drinking citations, Penn State coach Joe Paterno said yesterday. Quarless, 18, and Harriott, 20, are still working out with the team. "They're practicing with us, but they're not going to play for a while," Paterno said. Mickey Shuler, a redshirt sophomore, likely will start in place of Quarless, who had 21 catches for 288 yards and two touchdowns as a freshman.

Just when it seemed Penn State football was out of the eye of the storm, its players and its iconic coach have been pulled back into the maelstrom. Nittany Lions coach Joe Paterno said last night that defensive end Maurice Evans, defensive tackle Abe Koroma, and tight end Andrew Quarless would not play tomorrow against Oregon State after they were linked to a marijuana investigation at their campus apartment Tuesday night. Evans is an all-American candidate, and Koroma is also a starter.

And then there were six. Penn State tight end Andrew Quarless has been suspended indefinitely for an unspecified violation of team rules, according to football team spokesman Jeff Nelson. Quarless joins five other Lions who have been at least temporarily removed from the team for infractions since Jan. 25. First, it was defensive tackle Chris Baker, linebacker Navorro Bowman, and defensive back Knowledge Timmons. A few weeks later, defensive tackle Phil Taylor and wide receiver Chris Bell were suspended.

Suspended Penn State cornerback Knowledge Timmons was accepted into a first-time-offender's program Thursday for his actions after an October fight on the campus. Timmons also must serve a year of probation and complete one day of community service, his attorney, Karen Muir, said yesterday. The redshirt junior from York, Pa., was charged with two misdemeanors - disorderly conduct and defiant trespass - after he flipped over tables searching for his iPhone, police said. Because he was a first-time, nonviolent offender, Timmons was placed in the Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition (ARD)

Penn State coach Joe Paterno isn't sure when linebacker Navorro Bowman will return to the lineup. The 6-foot-1, 232-pound junior missed yesterday's game because of a groin injury and may not play Saturday against Temple. The Maryland native, who did not practice last week, was replaced by redshirt sophomore Nate Stupar in the starting lineup. "He says he's feeling better," Paterno said. "I don't know if he'll be better for the [Temple] game. I think it'll be close. If he's not 100 percent, I don't think it's fair to stick him in there.

After Daryll Clark played one of the best games of his career yesterday against Michigan, Joe Paterno went to bat for his senior quarterback. "I think, in all fairness, I don't think Daryll's gotten quite the credit he should get," the Penn State coach said after Clark threw for four touchdowns in the Nittany Lions' 35-10 victory over the Wolverines. "He's really played great football. Even when we got licked [by Iowa], he played a good game. People were critical of him, but people didn't catch the ball and that kind of stuff.

Joe Paterno had injury added to insult yesterday. At halftime of his team's 13-3 loss to Wisconsin, the Penn State coach was called an "old fart" on national television. The comment by ABC/ESPN analyst Craig James touched off a firestorm of angry reaction on Penn State Web sites. Worse, four plays into the second half, as he paced along the Camp Randall Stadium sideline, the 79-year-old Paterno suffered what appeared to be a serious injury to his left knee when tight end Andrew Quarless rolled into him. In obvious pain, unable to stand, Paterno was helped to a bench, had the leg secured while he attempted to monitor the game on the giant scoreboard, and was driven off the field on a motorized cart.

Penn State starting defensive linemen Maurice Evans and Abe Koroma will not play for the second straight game when the Nittany Lions travel to face Syracuse tomorrow. According to a team source, Evans and Koroma, suspended last week by coach Joe Paterno for their involvement in a marijuana investigation, will not make the trip. On Tuesday, Paterno said that he hadn't made a decision and was monitoring the situation "day by day. " He did not address the players' status during his weekly call-in radio show last night, either.

Those off-the-field distractions that Penn State players and coaches proclaimed are over apparently have no expiration date. Although no charges have yet been filed by Penn State campus police, Lt. Bill Moerschbacher has said the department is investigating a loud party Tuesday night at the Nittany Apartments complex at which a "small amount" of marijuana was seized, after issuance of a search warrant. The apartment is shared by Penn State players A.J. Wallace, Andrew Quarless, Maurice Evans and Abe Koroma.

Penn State football coach Joe Paterno addressed his involvement last Friday in a traffic dispute on campus during his call-in radio show, Nittany Lion Hotline , last night on WNTP-AM (990). "I've been accused of road rage," Paterno said. "I was only doing something I've done plenty of times to students. " Paterno explained that he saw a car drive through a stop sign on Bigler Road, at which point he honked his horn and pulled the car over to the side of the road. "I pointed my finger at [the woman driver]

IF THERE WERE such a thing as a college football fantasy draft - uh, wait a second, there is - it's a safe bet no current Penn State tight end would be selected. Penn State tight ends totaled only five receptions, 63 yards and a single touchdown in 2010. That was a pronounced dropoff from the previous season, when the position accounted for 53 catches, 631 yards and five TDs. Two of the tight ends in 2009, Andrew Quarless and Mickey Shuler Jr., were seniors who were drafted by NFL teams.

SOME COLLEGE football coaches have burly state troopers constantly around them on game day, serving as de facto bodyguards. In some ballparks, relief pitchers and catchers warming up in exposed bullpen areas are protected by another player stationed in such a way that he can snag line drives that might otherwise nail his unsuspecting teammates. It is becoming increasingly clear that injury-prone Penn State coach Joe Paterno will have to designate some large and observant backup player or players to serve in a similar capacity during games and even in practice.

Penn State head coach Joe Paterno suffered injuries to his right arm and hip after a player accidentally ran into him during a drill at Sunday's practice, the athletic department announced on Monday. The 84-year-old coach was blindsided by the player in Holuba Hall, the team's indoor practice facility, but walked away after the incident, according to a statement released by Penn State. Tests were being conducted at Mount Nittany Medical Center to determine the extent of the injuries, but Penn State director of Athletic Medicine Wayne Sebastianelli said he does not think the injuries will require surgery.

Penn State coaching icon Joe Paterno might consider his football players to be part of his extended family, but his interaction with them can be described as a form of tough love. Paterno tends to be stingy when it comes to publicly praising individual Nittany Lions, particularly those whose bodies of work have yet to be fully fleshed out. So it came as a bit of a surprise when JoePa's reaction to what proved to be a season-ending injury to sophomore wide receiver Curtis Drake last August seemed, well, just a bit excessive.

Joe Paterno hasn't lobbied for a return to leather helmets, the flying wedge and one-platoon football, but it wasn't so very long ago that he wistfully reiterated his belief that the college game would be better off if freshmen weren't eligible for varsity play. It would be more beneficial, he reasoned, for first-year kids to concentrate on academics and enjoy their introduction to campus life before tackling a sport that would consume so much of their time and energy. The 83-year-old Penn State coach might have a valid point, but college football today necessitates that certain rookies be thrown into the deep end of the pool on short notice.

Curtis Drake appeared to fit in perfectly with some of the older participants in yesterday's Day for Kids program at DisneyQuest, part of the festivities for this week's Capital One Bowl. But looking past all the video games and attractions in the indoor theme park, one could spot Drake - the former West Catholic star - wearing his Penn State jersey, a freshman taking a break with his teammates before practice. Joe Paterno has long been known for moving true freshmen into the lineup slowly, if at all, but Drake's versatility at wide receiver has put him in good standing with the veteran coach.

Daryll Clark was watching television in his hotel room, waiting to go downstairs for Penn State's pregame breakfast yesterday, when he heard ESPN draft analyst Todd McShay say, "Daryll Clark is an interception machine in big games. " "I'm like, 'Did he really say that? Wow, that was a low blow,' " the senior quarterback said. "I was really upset about it, but I couldn't let it bother me. I still had to play a football game. " Several hours later, Clark went out and, after a slow start, played one of his best games of the season.

Andrew Quarless remembers one of his last times in Joe Paterno's doghouse, when he sat in the coach's office and talked even though Paterno "didn't want to hear me. " "At the end of the conversation I said, 'I could sit here and speak all day, but I'm going to show you, and I'll show it with my actions,' " Quarless recalled. After a couple of run-ins with the law earlier in his career, Penn State's tight end appears to have pulled it all together this season. The 6-foot-5, 248-pound senior has performed well on the field, improving his NFL draft stock, but he also has been a laudable figure off the field, with his teammates and in his academic and personal life.

The thick glasses on Joe Paterno's rather prominent nose might be tinted, but they apparently don't distort his view of reality in terms of his football team. Another Senior Day at Beaver Stadium is fast approaching, and Saturday's final home game (against Indiana) for Penn State's departing veterans will again prove to be a time for hugs, tears and misty, water-colored memories of the way they were . . . or at least the way they'd like to think they were. "It's going to mean a lot to me," tight end Andrew Quarless said of the last time he and his fellow seniors will run out of the tunnel for an afternoon of football before the standard adoring turnout of 105,000-plus.

The Nittany Lions finally admitted it. Saturday's game against No. 12 Ohio State is a really big one, and despite Penn State's one-game-at-a-time approach, the No. 10 Lions have been eyeing it up for some time now. "It's a very big game," Penn State quarterback Daryll Clark said. "We've been waiting on this one for a while. Obviously it's a really big game with O State and Penn State. Everyone is very excited about it. " There is sure to be an electric atmosphere at 3:30 p.m. Saturday at Beaver Stadium when the Big Ten powers kick off. Every Penn State-Ohio State matchup of late has been highly anticipated and equally as entertaining.