Beaver Stadium

The Flyers have had preliminary discussions about playing a regular-season game at Penn State's Beaver Stadium against their archrivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins, club president Peter Luukko confirmed Wednesday. "We have spoken to the Pens and the league about expressing our combined interest," Luukko said. "Not sure if next year is a possibility. Penn State is very interested. " Outdoor games are all the rage in the NHL. Six of them are planned for next season, including events at Dodger Stadium, Yankee Stadium (twice)

Fun. Enthusiasm. Passion. Emotion. Morale. Swagger. Those are the buzzwords being tossed around by the Penn State football team this week as the Nittany Lions, whose most recent afternoon spent on a Big Ten Conference field (a 33-13 loss to Illinois on Oct. 9 in Beaver Stadium) was noticeably absent of any of those things, seek to restore whatever it is that might pump fresh life into a group that too often of late has appeared to be listless and uninvolved. Asked for a word that best describes the improved attitude he and his teammates presumably share coming off a much-needed bye week and heading into Saturday afternoon's conference game at Minnesota, Penn State linebacker Nate Stupar said, "I would say 'passion.

Penn State is studying the idea of expanding Beaver Stadium with more than just the traditional bench seating. A sports consulting firm is questioning members of the football booster club to gauge their interest in private luxury suites. The cost? Upwards of $60,000 a season or $400,000 for 10 years. And you still have to buy a ticket. "We have a waiting list right now," university director of athletics Timothy Curley said yesterday. "This season we weren't even able to accommodate our Nittany Lion Club members.

Beaver Stadium is now big enough to hold every man, woman and child in Reading while the entire population of Lancaster tailgates outside. It is a very big place - with a capacity of 83,770, it is the eighth- largest stadium in the country - and still the demand for rear-end space on one of those 120 rows of aluminum benches outruns the supply. Let's put it this way: If you go by the 1980 census, there are still 11,780,950 Pennsylvanians who could not fit into the place. Those who still would like to would be advised to do one of two things: enroll at Pennsylvania State University, maintain a 2.0 grade-point average and get one of the 20,000 student tickets; or listen to Nittany Lion football on one of 51 radio stations, and be patient.

One can sense the awe in Michael Fay's voice as he talks about Penn State and Beaver Stadium and the hope as he recounts the story of waiting a few years ago for someone on the Nittany Lions' coaching staff to make a recruiting call to him. The call never came, and the 6-foot-4, 294-pound junior from Allentown will line up at left guard for Kent State when it plays the Lions on Saturday. Still, Fay holds no grudge and eagerly awaits the opportunity to step on the green grass before more than 100,000 spectators.

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - It was two hours before kickoff of Penn State's biggest game of the year, and a 17-year-old wearing a navy sweat suit weaved through a sea of white-clad fans outside Beaver Stadium. He was the biggest celebrity in sight. Fans stopped to say hello to Christian Hackenberg, the five-star quarterback orally committed to play for Penn State next season. They high-fived him. They wished him luck in his senior season at Fork Union Military Academy (Va.). They wanted to thank him for sticking with his commitment to the Nittany Lions, even through the crippling NCAA sanctions, even through Penn State's 0-2 start.

Penn State must replace Beaver Stadium's football field after jubilant students celebrating a win over Michigan tore up sod on the 50-yard-line and in the end zones. Authorities yesterday continued their investigation of the late-night revelry, which began Saturday after the Nittany Lions' 31-24 victory at Ann Arbor. More than 10,000 students and other fans roamed campus in rowdy clusters, yelling in support of their team, which moved up to No. 1 Sunday in the Associated Press and CNN/ USA Today polls.

I know I have bad seats for the Penn State-West Virginia tussle when, instead of an usher, a Sherpa guide comes up to me and asks: "Can I see your ticket stub?" When he points up a steep incline of concrete steps to the snowcapped top row at Beaver Stadium, I fall in line behind a character wearing a Penn State jersey with two globular love handles spilling out the back. He squints up at his seats, down at his ticket, up at his seats, then over his shoulder at a women loaded down with sandwiches and sodas.

As a 32-year-old assistant in 1959, Joe Paterno told Penn State head coach Rip Engle that Nittany Lions football was headed for ruination. Paterno's dire prediction was prompted by the news that Beaver Field was going to be dismantled into 700 pieces and moved a mile east from the heart of the campus to a rural area. Only the displaced cows that grazed along the new site were more put out than Paterno. "I thought the stadium was already in an ideal spot," Paterno said. "I told Rip it would ruin football at Penn State.

Eddie George was so infatuated with Penn State football as a youngster that even his daydreams were in blue and white. The setting was the lush Beaver Stadium turf, and he'd close his eyes and imagine himself falling in line with all the great tailbacks who have passed through Happy Valley. Those dreams were fueled by his memory of jumping up and down in front of his television as a 13-year-old, watching the Nittany Lions grab the 1986 national championship with their win over Miami in the Fiesta Bowl.

The Flyers have had preliminary discussions about playing a regular-season game at Penn State's Beaver Stadium against their archrivals, the Pittsburgh Penguins, club president Peter Luukko confirmed Wednesday. "We have spoken to the Pens and the league about expressing our combined interest," Luukko said. "Not sure if next year is a possibility. Penn State is very interested. " Outdoor games are all the rage in the NHL. Six of them are planned for next season, including events at Dodger Stadium, Yankee Stadium (twice)

THE FLYERS have a familiar face returning to scout the goaltending crop in Europe. Former Flyers goaltender Antero Niittymaki, who recently retired after a season in the Finnish Elite League, was hired by the team on Wednesday to not only identify European goaltending prospects but skaters as well. "You don't need to spend much time with Antero to get a feel for his knowledge of all aspects of the game, and what it takes to play at the highest level," Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren said.

In 2015, Penn State will host Rutgers at Beaver Stadium for the first time in 21 years and play Maryland at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, the Big Ten Conference announced on Monday. During the 2014 football season, the Big Ten will welcome a pair of Penn State's oldest rivals in Maryland and Rutgers. They join Penn State, Indiana, Michigan, Michigan State, and Ohio State in the East Division. The Scarlet Knights will visit Beaver Stadium on Sept. 19, 2015, for the first time since a Sept.

Penn State will play three night games during the 2013 season, two in Beaver Stadium. Monday, the Nittany Lions announced that their Sept. 14 game against Central Florida will start at 6 p.m. The contest will air on the Big Ten Network. It will be the first evening BTN telecast from Beaver Stadium. The Nittany Lions will also play in the evening this season against Michigan (Oct. 12, 5 p.m.) and at Ohio State (Oct. 26, 8 p.m.).

THE NOISE engulfed Pete Massaro as he walked off the field that one last time at Beaver Stadium in November. The Penn State defensive end had that pins-and-needles feeling coursing through him. He never felt more alive on a football field. Penn State culminated a tumultuous season by pulling off a 24-21 overtime victory over eventual Big Ten champion Wisconsin, and Massaro, a Marple Newtown product, had played a part in it - along with the rest of the seniors on Penn State's team.

STATE COLLEGE - It was the third quarter. It was cold, windy, and sometimes snowy. And Bill O'Brien on the stadium microphone, imploring fans to do the wave. Such was the laid-back atmosphere of the Blue-White Game on Saturday in Beaver Stadium, in which a taut defense ended up on the right side of a complex scoring system, 67-47. Leading the way for the defense (the Blue team) was defensive lineman Austin Johnson, who notched five tackles and a pair of sacks, while defensive linemen Brad Bars and Evan Schwan had a pair of sacks.

Having watched one season of Penn State football under the direction of head coach and offensive maestro Bill O'Brien, the fans coming to Beaver Stadium for Saturday's annual Blue-White game know what to expect even if it will be presented in its most basic form. With the Big Ten Network televising the game, which marks the end of spring football practice, you can be sure O'Brien will reveal only fundamental formations on offense and vanilla packages on defense because every conference opponent will have the DVR humming.

On freshman orientation day at Penn State, Great Valley's Chris Geiss could easily skip the suggested tour around campus. His father, Robert, was a member of the school's band, and his mother, Pat, played lacrosse for the Nittany Lions. They passed their love of all that is State College along to their son. "Ever since I was born, I've gone to at least one game each season," Chris Geiss said. "It's almost like it's my second home. " In realizing one of his childhood dreams, the 6-foot-3, 190-pound senior will soon be spending ample time at Beaver Stadium.

Penn State athletic director Dave Joyner announced Monday that Virginia will not play a football game on Sept. 14 at Beaver Stadium in order to play its own home game on that date. "We are working with Virginia to reschedule the game for Beaver Stadium in a future season," Joyner said in a statement. "We have begun discussions to find an opponent for the Sept. 14. "  

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - A snow-covered field in Centre County, especially one so near to fetid cow barns and massive Beaver Stadium, seems an odd place to honor the longtime superintendent of a golf course 150 miles away. But here, amid small fir trees on a remote corner of Penn State's vast campus, stands a small fieldstone memorial to the namesake of the surrounding Joseph E. Valentine Turfgrass Research Center. That rock, rising above the mid-January whiteness like an Alpine peak, was dug from the ground at Merion Golf Club's historic 11th hole.