What defines the health of a major college athletics program?

Is it success in every sport?

Is it the ability of its teams to generate revenue, through tickets sold or television contracts?

Is it the rate at which its student-athletes graduate?

Or is it simply how good its football team is?

The answers differ depending on whom you ask, and most athletic administrators would lobby for an “E. All of The Above” option. But if your answer to the last question is “pretty good” or better, chances are your athletic department is in good shape.

On Friday, Penn State’s Board of Trustees voted, by a comfortable margin, to push through plans for an eight-figure renovation of the Lasch Building, also known as Nittany Lion football headquarters.

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Following a Breakout 2020, Penn State’s Top Pass Catcher Can’t Hide Under The Radar Now That He’s the Focal Point of an Offense Known for Piling Up Points and Video-Game Statistics

Love to say ‘We Told You So’…so WE TOLD YOU SO!

As the last drops of Penn State’s 2020 season circled the drain vs. Illinois, a swarm of Keyboard Kiper’s – many of them Friends of the Blog — stormed Twitter to say goodbye to Nittany Lions WR Jahan Dotson following his 6-reception, 189-yard, 2-touchdown cap to a 52-reception, 884-yard, 8-touchdown campaign. To them, Dotson was as good as gone. So long Penn State. Hello, paycheck football. 

Because we’re not popular enough to make enemies (God, it’s gonna be SWEET once we are, though. Sitting there in a big, oversized chair petting an evil cat like the faceless bad guy from Inspector Gadget), we won’t screenshot those Tweets.

Instead, we’ll have our DD take the high road and repost our rum-fueled response to those Tweets from DISPENSING THOUGHTS AND OPINIONS: ILLINOIS POSTGAME

I’ll gladly die alone on my ‘Jahan Dotson needs to stay’ hill if necessary, dang it. What’s the rush? Why leave an advantageous situation (returning QB, returning OC) to become a 3rd or 4th Round NFL Draft pick and find yourself locked in a terrible (comparatively) less-than-a-million-dollars-a-year contract for 4 seasons? …If Dotson builds off what he did in 2020, I don’t think it’s inconceivable No. 5 sneaks in the end of the 1st Round.

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It’s Valentine’s Day, and Penn State football fans are in search of a new love – under center.

The recent departures of Will Levis and Micah Bowens leave the Nittany Lions with three scholarship quarterbacks – senior Sean Clifford, redshirt sophomore Ta’Quan Roberson and freshman Christian Veilleux. However bullish you are on Clifford’s chances of returning to his 2019 form or surpassing it in Mike Yurcich’s system, there is room there for an experienced transfer to either back up Clifford as Roberson and Veilleux develop or to claim the starting job outright.

As the staff mulls its options in the portal, including Tyler Shough, who announced his decision to transfer from Oregon on Friday, they would be wise to value certain traits over others – both those any transfer already possesses and those the coaches think they can develop.

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Word of Advice for the Harvard Newbie: Don’t Tell Us How Wood Drastically Underestimates the Impact of Social Distinctions Predicated Upon Wealth, Especially Inherited Wealth. We Know You Got it From Vickers, ‘Work in Essex County,’ Page 98. Yeah, We Read That, Too. 

When assessing new Penn State offensive guard Eric Wilson – the latest (last?) of James Franklin’s Transfer Portal pickups – we got some good news and we got some bad news for you. 

Which do you want first?

The good news? OK, that’s an unorthodox choice, but whatever.

Good News: After spending the weekend scouting two Harvard games from 2019, we feel confident proclaiming Wilson (the Crimson’s starting left guard) is a better run/pass blocker than he is a PSA spokesperson. 

Sigh…where do we even begin? 

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So the final results are in for Penn State’s Class of 2021. And they’re … not great, at least not by recent standards. The Nittany Lions’ 16 signees gave them the 21st-best class in the nation according to the 247Sports Composite Team Rankings, representing the program’s lowest ranking since 2014, when James Franklin wrapped up the 24th-ranked class in just his fourth week on the job.

When you consider not so much the circumstances but just how many different people were involved in assembling that class, though, it becomes a little more impressive.

This past week, tight ends coach Tyler Bowen took a job with the Jacksonville Jaguars, becoming the 13th Penn State assistant to leave the program – willingly or otherwise – since the end of the 2015 season. His replacement, former Nittany Lion offensive lineman Ty Howle, became the program’s sixth new assistant coach since the end of the 2019 season. Of the eight assistant coaches who came with Franklin to State College from Vanderbilt in 2014, only Brent Pry remains (as does Terry Smith, who was not with them at Vanderbilt but joined the Penn State staff that year).

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The Photo in the Dictionary Next to the Definition of ‘Game-Time Decision’ For Most of 2020, the Veteran Penn State Cornerback Surprisingly Put the NFL on Hold For One More Season of Saturdays Instead of Sundays 

So what can Tariq Castro-Fields do next season to boost his NFL Draft stock?

Well, I’m going to write approximately 1,000 words and kill a bunch of digital trees, but to answer that question just as well, really, two words would suffice: STAY HEALTHY.

In a season that COVID already abbreviated, TCF’s 2020 campaign shrunk further to more of a cameo. After flashing in man coverage vs. Indiana, and then being largely avoided vs. Ohio State, Castro-Fields suffered some sort of upper body injury (I think) midway through the 3rd Quarter of the Maryland debacle when assisting on a tackle. It’s tough to map out what exactly occurred during the play because TCF (top of the screen) gets obstructed from view and the BTN AV Club Intern working the camera doesn’t follow the ball.

After resting on the ground long enough for the director to run a graphics package showcasing Maryland’s offensive accolades, TCF got up and walked off the field without assistance. 

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Despite Earning High Honors From Several Reputable Sources, Penn State’s Returning Safety Must Find More Ways to Change Games and Make Plays in 2021

Close your eyes. 

No, seriously close them. Promise we’re not going to do any weird stuff. Trust us, we outgrew the Sharpie-on-the-face/fingers-in-warm-water sophomoric prank phase months ago…alright, fine, weeks ago. Point is we outgrew it.  

Just close your eyes. OK, are they closed? You sure? Liar. You can’t read with closed eyes. Our bad, though. Hmmm, guess we didn’t really think this exercise through.

Anyway, what we tried (and failed) to get you to do was envision certain Penn State players’ signature moments from 2020. Like, if we said Jahan Dotson, many would probably replay his sweet one-handed grab/stab over Ohio State’s Shaun Wade…or perhaps you’d pick his punt return TD vs. Sparty…or maybe the two short tosses Dotson turned into 6 points in the season finale.  

Penn State defensive end Shaka Toney had his man-possessed two-sack flurry on what SHOULD have been Indiana’s final drive. That’s his moment. Redshirt freshman tight end Brenton Strange pulled off that cool Superman/grass in the facemask TD. Sean Clifford has a healthy mix of moments – good and bad.  

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Probably the Most ‘NFL Ready’ Among Those Who Pushed Going Pro Back a Year, the Penn State Junior OT Could Have the Chance to Shake the Commissioner’s Hand in April 2022 

For Rasheed Walker, it’s 1st Round or Bust.

Not “Bust” in the sense that if he doesn’t hear Roger Goodell call his name on Day 1 of the 2022 NFL Draft he’s a bum or something, but rather “Bust” in the context that of the 4 Penn State returnees, Walker is the player with a clearly-defined financial objective this fall. So anything less than coming off the board in the first 32 picks would be a disappointment. 

Because, really, Walker was the ONLY Penn State draft-eligible player posed with a truly difficult stay-or-go decision – bail early and likely get selected in the 3rd Round (maaaaybe late 2nd), or press pause on the pros and chase the very REAL possibility of being the first Nittany Lions O-lineman to go in the 1st Round since 2007?

Not an easy choice…which explains why Walker waited so long to announce his intentions. 

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“Control freak” isn’t the nicest term to describe college football coaches, partly because half of that term is the word “freak” and partly because it paints the picture of a person who simply cannot have enough control, as if it is a commodity rather than a hard-to-define, relative construct, particularly as it pertains to several dozen giant young men beating the hell out of each other for three hours on 12-14 Saturdays each year.

So let us, then, refer to them instead as “organizational enthusiasts,” which is basically the same idea but suggests that the coaches are more about keeping order and consistency and less about being tyrants.

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Oh look! It’s a Duke Defender Capable of Shutting Down Offenses Without Slapping The Floor First. How Refreshing.

As your phonetics/pronunciation Blog of Record, let’s clear up any confusion: it’s Tangelo like Michelangelo – say it fast, don’t pause –not Tangelo as in Pauly D’s favorite pastime/goopy dessert.

For those of you who are better auditory learners vs. visual learners, go to Duke’s official 2020 roster, scroll down, and click the little ear icon. Got it? Cool.

So now that we’ve moved beyond how to properly say his name, why don’t we figure out what to make of this under-the-radar high school recruit turned productive Power 5 starting defensive tackle. To do that, we scouted the 2020 Duke-Syracuse game (Tangelo’s best game according to PFF) and the 2020 Duke-Notre Dame opener (Tangelo’s lowest-graded game according to PFF).

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