More-confident Lions Still Have Hurdles

By JERRY KELLAR [email protected]
Wednesday, October 31, 2001 Page: 2B

After two emotionally draining Big Ten games, Penn State’s football team
must crank it again this weekend against a non-conference opponent.

Whether the young Nittany Lions can is the question nagging their coach.
“Absolutely. That’s a big concern,” Joe Paterno said Tuesday. “That
comes particularly with a young team. When you’re mature, you’ve been through
it.

“You’ve got to make sure they pay attention to detail, because just
because you’ve won two in a row doesn’t mean you can’t lose one.”

Riding the wave of a two-game winning streak, Penn State (2-4, 2-3 Big Ten)
can’t afford a letdown against Conference USA’s Southern Mississippi (4-2)
Saturday at Beaver Stadium (12:10 p.m., ESPN2).

The Lions must win four of their remaining five contests to qualify for a
bowl, and Paterno is well aware the Golden Eagles are capable of stunting his
team’s momentum.

“I don’t think we are looking at it right now as conference or
non-conference,” he said. “We are just looking at the fact that we are
playing a good football team. Hopefully, we are starting to feel a little bit
better about ourselves playing a good team.”

After rallying in the final seconds at Northwestern, the Lions came back
from an 18-point, second-half deficit to edge Ohio State, 29-27, last week at
Beaver Stadium. Redshirt freshman quarterback Zack Mills was instrumental in
both wins, each time taking over for starter Matt Senneca.

Mills, the Big Ten’s Offensive Player of the Week, broke the school record
for single-game total offense with his 418-yard performance against the
Buckeyes. He was 17-of-32 for a career-high 280 yards with two touchdowns
while racking up a team-best (and career-high) 138 yards rushing on 15 carries
with one TD.

Paterno, however, isn’t ready to hand the starting job to the left-hander
just yet.

“I probably will play both of them,” he said.

Whoever gets the nod behind center, he will have the benefit of throwing to
a group of receivers who suddenly have found their confidence. After a
prolonged slump which saw them drop almost everything tossed their way, Lion
wide outs Bryant Johnson and Tony Johnson have made several clutch grabs in
the team’s wins.



The fact that senior split end Eddie Drummond continues to struggle bothers
Paterno. Drummond dropped two passes against OSU, one which directly led to a
Buckeye TD.

“We are going to get Eddie back,” he said. “Eddie is too good a football
player not to get back to where he can have some fun playing.”

Another worry for Paterno is a secondary which has been victimized by
several big plays, including two long passes for scores by the Buckeyes.

“They are almost all the same kind of plays, deep post kind of plays,” he
said. “I am concerned about it.”



More honors: True freshman placekicker Robbie Gould was named the
conference’s Special Teams Player of the Week after booting a career-high
three field goals against OSU. Gould drilled a pair of 46-yarders, the longest
of his brief career, along with a 23-yarder. He was also two-for-two on PATs
for a total of 11 points. ...

Saturday is Homecoming at the stadium, not that it means a heck of a lot to
Paterno.

“If somebody hadn’t told me yesterday that it was Homecoming, I wouldn’t
even know it was Homecoming.” ...

Technical problems with the phone system caused havoc with Tuesday’s
teleconference. That prompted a reporter to ask the coach: “With the (cost
behind the) stadium expansion, what do you think about the phone not
working.”

Answered Paterno: “I am not going to say a word about that, but I was
thinking it.”