So, after nearly two-and-a-half years, 515 posts, I’m calling quits…And moving to a new website, Linebacker-U.com. I’ll be teaming up with Mike from Zombie Nation and Galen & Nick from The Nittany Line to form as Galen calls it, “The Voltron of Penn State blogs.”
I first started up HHV back when I was a young, confused first-year law student. Even though I was surrounded by PSU alums at the school, none of them shared the same enthusiasm I had for PSU sports, which was a huge culture shock for myself. Not to mention, I had mulled doing a blog for the longest time as I had a habit of writing up notes on Facebook every once in a while with my own ‘random thoughts’ about PSU sports. I suppose you could say the apathy of my fellow alums provoked me to finally take the plunge and I’m proud to say, I haven’t looked back since.
Thank you to all of you who have read this and come back for more and thank you especially to those of you who left comments/criticism. It’s always a pleasure to interact with my fellow readers. This is not the end, far from it. I’m excited for this new venture that I feel will provide me opportunities to write more thoughtful posts.
Anyway, that’s enough teary-eyed shit. Head on over to LBU, as my preview of tonight’s basketball game against Michigan is up and in the immortal words of one Charley Steiner, “FOLLOW ME, FOLLOW ME TO FREEDOM!”
Oh, and in case you’re wondering: I still plan on using “Happy Hour Valley” as my Twitter user name. Otherwise, my name is “Tim,” nice to meet you.
Twenty years ago tonight, Brent Musberger one-upped Dick Clark on New Year’s Eve with his drunken play-by-play of the ball dropping in Times Square. May you be as pleasantly Musberger’ed yourself tonight…
Oh, and skip to the 1:30 mark in the video to watch the fun begin.
IT’S PENN STATE! IT’S VIRGINIA TECH! EVERYBODY WEAR WHITE! WE’LL EVEN GIVE YOU “BLINKING SHAKERS” TO MAKE YOUR THE OPPONENT FEEL LIKE INDIANA JONES IN THE SNAKE PIT! COME ONE, COME ALL! BASKETBALL MEDIOCRITY AT ITS FINEST!
Alright, I think I did my part to advertise Penn State’s latest quirky promotion for tonight’s game (7 PM ET, ESPN2). I’m really not in a mood to get a full-fledged preview up for this one, but I will say from my quick research that Va Tech is an awful shooting team, from both inside and outside. However, they did rack up a school-record 16 blocks against VMI in their last game which should be eye-opening even if VMI is an undersized team that plays a very frenetic style of tempo that involves jacking up the first open shot they get (usually a three pointer). Forward Jeff Allen will challenge our front line with his 8.4 rebounds/game (including 13 against VMI), it’s imperative that PSU doesn’t allow him to get his share of offensive boards like they did against Temple.
It’s also crucial that Talor Battle transforms back into Man-Crushing Talor Battle and racks up 20+ points against this Hokie team, his 32 points at Virginia were a difference-maker in PSU’s lone win over a power conference opponent this year. Ed DeChellis also needs to go with a lineup deeper than seven guys if he hopes to hang with this team..just a suggestion.
Even though the line on this game is dead even, my head tells me to pick Va Tech to win this because their rebounding and defense should compensate for their not-so-great shooting. However, my heart tells me that PSU will find a way to win once again, in front of a nationally televised audience so I’ll take the good guys in a very tight one. I’m also down big-time in the contest with Battle Does It Again and need to catch up, because he’s picking Va Tech to win. BDIA sports a 5-1 record so far while I’m straggling behind at 2-4. If BDIA is right again (basketball gods forbid), then I may be forced to declare him the winner before Big Ten play even starts.
Still-photo from a prior ACC beatdown of the Big Ten
Tonight marks the opening of the 11th Annual Big Ten/ACC Challenge* and who better to tip off such a prestigious one-sided affair than two schools that will be battling for supremacy in the bottom halves of their respective conferences? Penn State will have to travel tonight to Virginia in their first true road game of the season with hopes of beating one of the 25 douchiest colleges in America on their home court.
*And by ‘challenge’ I mean, ‘3rd degree butt-rape’ courtesy of the ACC
Needless to say, we’ll all be pretty elated if the Fighting DeChellises are able to steal a victory on the road when they have yet to show any consistency in rebounding or defense so far. Unfortunately, Virginia isn’t going to do us any favors with their half-court game (courtesy of new head coach Tony Bennett) led by Mr. Do-Everything guard Sylven Landesberg (16.2 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 2.8 apg), and a solid post player in Mike Scott (12.5 ppg, 9.0 rpg). Did I also mention they feature a 3-point bomber in Sammy Zeglinski who’s hit half of his 23 3-point attempts?
If the 6-point underdog road warriors want to have any realistic chance of pulling the shocker of the year, they’re going to have to play sound defense for once and also crash the boards (Earth to AJ III, come in, AJ III). It also would help if somebody other than Talor Battle scores consistently out of the backcourt (I’m looking at you – Tim Frazier and Chris Babb). Bill Edwards also needs to continue providing his instant offense off the bench (10 points vs. Sacred Heart last game) and David Jackson while I don’t expect him to get anywhere near his 26 points, needs to continue to show those nifty post moves he displayed against Sacred Heart.
Perhaps I’m being too negative here, but I have yet to see any consistency out of this team in key areas necessary to win you tons of basketball games. Hopefully that changes tonight, but in the meantime, I’m taking UVA to cover. Battle Does It Again, who has a little more time on his hands to do a solid preview is feeling a tad more optimistic and is calling for PSU to lose but to beat the spread. So far he’s 2-1 while I stand at 1-2 after he correctly picked Sacred Heart to beat the spread last time.
May your turkey-induced stupor be a pleasant one. Before I sign off for the rest of the week, here’s a short list of things that Yours Truly is thankful for:
Supporting a football program with a 10-2 record that most other teams would KILL to have.
Rich Rodriguez, for helping PSU start a winning streak of their own against Michigan and also gain two of the most lopsided victories in the PSU-Michigan series.
Aaron Rodgers quarterbacking my fantasy football team. Here’s to him lighting up Detroit for 400+ yards and 6 TD’s today.
The fact that last night’s game against Sacred Heart wasn’t a H-O-R-S-E contest. Because if it were, Sacred Heart beats us by about 50 points with all those three-balls they hit.
David Jackson finally stepping up as a reliable scorer (career-high 26 points last night)
Bill Edwards’ knee healing much quicker than expected. May last night’s double-digit scoring game for him be the first of many, particularly once Big Ten season hits us.
And of course, you can’t be truly thankful as a PSU fan without thanking a certain 5′11″ point guard for providing scores of YouTube highlights, such as the one below.
So, Penn State once again delivered their nearly-annual beat-down of Michigan State, Mark Dantonio didn’t use up his timeouts, and the team earned their 10-2 record as most people predicted in the long summer months earlier. In other words, the universe unfolded as it was supposed to and just like that, the most un-dramatic and boring season in recent PSU football history came to a close. Seriously, name one game or play that you’re going to fondly remember from this season in 2014, Navorro Bowman’s pick-six against Indiana? Even the losses lacked drama, save for Iowa’s Adrian Clayborn brushing Nick Sukay aside like Scut Farkus did to Ralphie’s brother in A Christmas Story, stuffing a surprised Jeremy Boone’s punt, and having the ball magically bounce into his hands for an easy TD return, further dooming PSU fans to another debacle that will be firmly entrenched into the vast plains of YouTube.
The boring-ness of this season also contributed partially to my lack of posting/lack of enthusiasm in coming with posts this season, it even got to the point where I lost enthusiasm in my Big Ten Power Rankings and started slacking on them big-time to the point where I just mailed it in this year. It also didn’t help that I started an online grad program in September which means I do far more sitting in front of a computer than I’d like to, and that doesn’t exactly motivate me to spend an hour or two trying to type up a decent blog post.
Enough of my rambling though, we now have two weeks of anxious anticipation and Facebook politicking before we find out whether PSU or Iowa gets selected as the Big Ten’s second representative in the BCS (remember – only two teams per conference can make it to the BCS and Ohio State already is Rose Bowl bound). The Fiesta Bowl actually picks before the Orange Bowl does and word on the street is, they like Iowa. At the same time though, I’ve read from various message board jibber-jabber about Oklahoma State being a favorite to get picked up by the Fiesta if they can beat their archrival Sooners this week. If the BCS committee goes with Okie State, you can surely bet on Penn State’s “terrific” chances of being selected by the Orange Bowl reps. Until December 6th though, all we can do is speculate away…
Unfortunately, real world shit has got me bogged down once again this week, which means you’re probably not going to see anything in the way of posting for the rest of the week after today. The Fighting DeChellises start their Charleston Classic adventure tomorrow against UNC-Wilmington (4 PM ET ESPNU), should they win, they will face the winner of Miami and Tulane on Friday. Should they get past the Miami-Tulane winner, they will play on Sunday for the title. Needless to say, tomorrow’s game is a must-win if they want to face any quality opponents in this tourney.
I’m also up in the air on whether PSU will keep the Land Grant Trophy for a second straight year, Michigan State is a far better team than their 6-5 record indicates. I worry about our D-line’s ability to pressure Kirk Cousins and our not-so-special teams giving up a big punt return or two, much like they did against OSU. I’m feeling a high-scoring affair though given that MSU’s defense isn’t so hot, either.
So my entire week has been at the mercy of a dreaded term paper which conveniently enough was due the weekend of the Ohio State game…awesome. As a result, there’s not going to be any full-fledged preview but rather some quick thoughts on tomorrow’s game:
Judging from what I’ve read on numerous Penn State and Ohio State blogs, both sides appear quite confident in their respective team’s chances. PSU fans will point out how erratic Pryor has been in the passing attack and how the Buckeyes lack a solid running game outside of Pryor’s scrambling abilities which will play perfectly into the hands of the PSU defense. Furthermore, PSU fans seem confident that the O-line will fare much better against this staunch OSU D-line than they did against Iowa’s, allowing Daryll Clark & Co. to do some serious damage to the Buckeye secondary. Inevitably, they will also point the fact that Ohio State lost to a crappy Purdue team and that Terrelle Pryor pulled a pseudo-Adam Morrison on the bench (see: crying on national TV) last year after throwing a game-clinching interception.
OSU fans on the other hand will point out PSU’s crap-tastic schedule and how they lost to the only respectable team they’ve played so far (Iowa). They will further harp on how “improved” Pryor is since the Purdue loss, as if racking up points against Minnesota and New Mexico State is a quality indicator of one’s quarterbacking ability. They will also point out their own stingy D-line and its capability to wreak havoc on the PSU O-line and thus get plenty of shots at Clark and whoever decides to carry the ball out of the backfield. They will also complain how ‘classless’ PSU fans are for poking fun at Pryor’s crying session.
Both sides have some legitimate points: OSU has looked lost offensively this year for the most part, and Pryor’s previous two solid passing performances against New Mexico State and Minnesota could’ve been performed by high school quarterbacks. He has yet to show that he can throw the ball well against a top-notch defense like he will be facing tomorrow and next week against Iowa. TP also is not going to be able to win the ballgame for his team on his legs alone, he’s going to need to Brandon Saine, Dan Herron, or some other tailback to step up. Neither tailback has looked impressive so far and I don’t see that changing this weekend against a PSU defense ranked 5th in the nation, giving up only 84 yards per game on the ground.
If the Buckeyes are going to pull out the “W” it’s going to be done through the defense creating some critical turnovers deep in PSU territory or even scoring a TD. That’s how Iowa got it done, after all, and it’s perhaps the greatest fear PSU fans have for tomorrow. If PSU’s O-line gets pushed around all day by the Buckeyes’ front four, you can rest assured it will be hell on Earth for Evan Royster and Daryll Clark as the running lanes will be clogged and Clark will have less than a millisecond to get off a pass before he’s forced to start running for his life. Tressel-ball will be alive and well as you can expect to see OSU try to win the field-position battle and attempt to force a critical PSU turnover deep in their own territory.
Additionally, the special teams have been notably cringe-worthy: While Jeremy Boone can put up punts as powerful as Pryor’s arm-punts, he is awfully slow at getting his punts off. Twice, this has led to disaster occurring in the form of a blocked punt, the first one which led to PSU’s only blemish on the season so far. For all the crap Colin Wagner has gotten this year, he’s actually done a decent job as placekicker. Sure, he rarely puts kicks into the end zone but he’s quietly strung together a 10-for-14 field goal performance this year with all but one of his misses being from 45+ yards out. The real culprit on special teams though is the lack of a return game of any kind, particularly in the two-man fair-catch calling formations the coaching staff has fallen in love with this year. Fortunately for PSU, the Buckeyes’ kicker Aaron Pettrey is out with an injury and their backup Devin Barclay is 1-for-3 on the year in field goals. I can’t say that making your starting kicking debut at Beaver Stadium is ideal for someone like Barclay…
Now, with all that being said, I’m expecting a higher scoring contest than last year despite the fact both JoePa and Tressel will get conservative with the playcalling. I see both teams forcing turnovers that set up short field position which they take advantage of. I also envision the PSU offense being able to the move the ball consistently enough and the PSU defense will force Pryor to try and beat them patiently with his arm (i.e. no giving up long-bombs for TDs) and if there’s one thing that Pryor seems to struggle with, it’s patience.
Pryor sure made a good point when he mentioned how everyone kills people, murders people, steals from others, whatever… Look for PSU to do the same to him this weekend….
Sure, every game we’ve played at Northwestern since 1993 has either been a loss or a nail-biter of a victory for us but those of you looking for a similar type of victory are going to be disappointed tomorrow. Northwestern’s defense, which has already been average at best is banged up on that side of the ball, not to mention it’s happening in the secondary which also happens to be their weakest link (73rd in the nation is pass efficiency defense). Look for Daryll Clark to pick the Wildcats apart through the air along with a balanced rushing attack led by Evan Royster and the up-and-coming Brandon Beachum, PSU should have little trouble moving the football.
While their passing attack has been pretty solid (the one bright spot besides Corey Wootton anchoring their D-line), you might also want to note the following rushing stats (courtesy of ESPN.com)
That’s right, boys and girls: Mike Kafka, Northwestern’s QB is the team’s leader in carries and rushing yards. This is not exactly the proper recipe for a team looking to score a flurry of points on a defense as stingy as PSU’s (1st in the nation in scoring defense, 4th in total defense). The Wildcats come off as extremely one-dimensional, much like that Minnesota team PSU faced a couple weeks ago whose sole source of meaningful offensive production was Eric Decker. Hopefully, I don’t need to remind you how many points Minnesota scored on us in that matchup.
Now, to be fair: Northwestern has more than one go-to receiver (Zeke Markhausen and Andrew Brewer both have over 500 yards receiving plus 7 TDs combined) so they’ll move the ball a little more effectively than Minny ever did, but expect PSU to throw their linebackers into coverage and contain the short passes they love to throw oh-so-often, not to mention having Sean Lee or Navorro Bowman act as a ’spy’ on Mike Kafka whenever he tries to pull a daring escape trick. And of course, there’s Jared Odrick, Ollie Ogbu, and the rest of the D-line getting consistent pressure on Kafka and clogging up what little sliver of a running lane Northwestern’s ball carriers may find.
PREDICTION: Penn State 38, Northwestern 13…So long as Ryan Field’s security personnel is able to keep the Japanese away.
I’m not sure how many PSU basketball fans realized this, but this past season marked the first time in the Ed DeChellis era that we didn’t suffer through a year where one of the following happened:
The revolving transfer door was in heavy use by key players seeking to get a fresh start elsewhere(see: 2003-05)*
Devastating injuries to key players forced them to miss a significant amount of playing time and thus, caused significant losing skids (see: Danny Morrissey in 2005, Geary Claxton’s junior and senior years, Jamelle Cornley’s junior year.
I can’t emphasize this enough, a good portion of our success last season should be attributed to the fact that nobody in our starting lineup was sidelined for a lengthy amount of time, this finally allowed us to field our strongest possible lineup night-in and night-out in a very stingy Big Ten league.
UNIVERSITY PARK, PA., Oct. 29, 2009 – The Nittany Lion basketball team suffered its first set-back of the season on Wednesday when 6-6, 235-pound freshman forward Bill Edwards (Middletown, Ohio) suffered a partial tear to the MCL in his right knee during a morning practice.
Team doctors expect Edwards to miss 4-6 weeks with the injury making his scheduled return to the line-up sometime in mid-December. Edwards, who was named the 2009 Ohio Senior Player of the Year after averaging 17.4 ppg and 9.0 rpg as a senior, had been impressive in the preseason with a smooth left-handed shot from the three-point arc and strength taking the ball into the lane and was expected to earn playing time early in the Nittany Lions season.
Now, the good news here is that it’s only a partial tear and it’s of the MCL as opposed to the ACL. With that being said though, by the time Edwards recovers, PSU will be on the verge of starting the Big Ten slate which isn’t exactly the best time to start taking your first collegiate basketball lumps. He’ll be brought along slowly and perhaps with fewer minutes of playing time than originally hoped for. It’s undoubtedly a blow to our depth, as Edwards and Tim Frazier were the two freshman expected to make an immediate impact which could certainly be used given the losses of Cornley, Pringle, and Morrissey. Let’s just hope this is the worst it gets…
