The Penn State Nittany Lions (2-0) travel to Auburn, AL as they meet the Auburn Tigers (2-0) in one of the early season marquee matchups. The Big 10 collides with the ACC in this matchup in a battle of arguably the two toughest football conferences in America. The Nittany Lions are coming off an easy 46-10 home win over Ohio while the Tigers won a surprisingly challenging game over San Jose State at home. With conference play looming, each team will look to remain unbeaten as we hit the final two weekends in September. The opening kickoff is slated for 3:30pm EST.
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Penn State heads into Auburn hoping to build off their 2-0 start that includes a tough road win over Purdue to kick off the season. Last Saturday, the #22 Nittany Lions easily took out Ohio at home, 46-10. Penn State rolled up 572 yards of total offense for the game and built a 26-7 lead by halftime in the 2022 home opener at Beaver Stadium. The Nittany Lions ha 234 yards on the ground and another 338 through the air. Quarterback Sean Clifford went 19-of-27 for 213 yards and a touchdown for the day. A whopping 17 Nittany Lions had at least one catch in the easy win.
Head Coach James Franklin was pleased with the results of the home opener: “First of all, like always, I appreciate everybody coming out and covering Penn State Football. I want to give Ohio a ton of credit. I thought they did a good job. I think they have a really good team. I think they're going to have a lot of success in their conference this year. We talk about our situations that we talk about all time, like drive starts, we started our 34, and they started their 23. We won that turnover battle 0-0, so that was a tie and we've obviously got to create some more big plays and turnovers on defense. On the penalty battle, we did not win, we were 4-35 and 3-35. Then explosive plays, we were able to win that at 15.8%, if our math was correct, to 9.1%. Some positives there. Obviously, we were able to get some explosive plays in the running game, which was helpful. We were able to get a win. We were able to gain a ton of experience for a bunch of players. We were able, for the most part, to keep our guys healthy and fresh so we can have a great week this week and take the next step as a program. Great crowd, love the support that we get. It is truly special and we're very appreciative and we never take that for granted. Appreciate everybody coming out to support Penn State Football.”
Freshman standout running back Nicholas Singleton had a huge day with 10 carries for 179 yards, with two touchdowns of 70 and 44-yards. He also added a 48-yard un as well. The 179 yards is a new PSU record for a Beaver Stadium debut. He also became the first Nittany Lion to rush for multiple 40+ yard touchdowns in a game since November of 2002.
takin' a trip down south ??? pic.twitter.com/lYtcmBbEmE
— Penn State Football (@PennStateFball) September 14, 2022
Defensively, Penn State held Ohio to 264 total yards and only one play of over 20 yards. They held the Bobcats to just 4-of-15 on third down and had five sacks in the game. Penn State did not cause any turnovers but did not turn the ball over themselves either. The Nittany Lions secondary did have nine pass breakups on the day.
Through two games, Penn State is average nearly 41 points per game while holding the opposition to just 20 points per game. They are averaging 489 yards of total offense thus far while limiting teams to 344.5 yards per game. Thus far, the Nittany Lions look like they may have found their ground game again after a couple of seasons relying solely on the pass. They are averaging 166 yards per game on the ground this season while limiting the opposition to 88. They are winning the time of possession battle thus far, 31 minutes to 28 minutes and are averaging nine penalties per game compared with 12 for opposing teams. Las tly, the Nittany Lions have turned the ball over just once thus far while only causing one turnover.