It is Penn State vs Auburn this weekend for the annual White Out at Beaver Stadium. The Nittany Lions enter the game 2-0 and so does Auburn. College GameDay will once again be set up on Old Main Lawn bright and early Saturday morning and the game will be played at 7:30 pm ET on ABC. Let’s take a look at a few things to watch for.
Penn State vs Auburn: White Out Edition
The first thing to watch out for is a fully packed Beaver Stadium on Saturday night. The Centre Daily Times reported an attendance of 105,323 against Ball State last week. Look for that number to be at the maximum 106,572 this week against Auburn, or even higher. Jordan-Hare Stadium, where the Auburn Tigers play, only holds 87,451 fans. During his weekly press conference, Tigers head coach Bryan Harsin addressed the crowd noise stating, “We’ll crank the music up, or the sound and the crowd noise and the music, whatever it is that we have to use to make it very loud. And then we’re gonna have to simulate a little bit that we can’t hear at certain times. … That’s not going to be an excuse for us.”
While Auburn may be able to anticipate the noise level and practice scenarios for not being able to hear, the White Out likely won’t be like anything these Tigers players have heard before. Take Penn State vs. Michigan in 2019. The wolverines had played in the White Out before but were unprepared for the noise level. Ultimately taking a timeout before the first offensive play of the game. As for Penn State head coach James Franklin’s take on the White Out? He stated in his weekly press conference, “I’m willing to buy Halls for everybody that loses their voice on Saturday. Halls, we would appreciate your support with this as well.”
Special Teams: Penn State Kicking Woes
Normally we would be highlighting the different quarterback play with Sean Clifford and Bo Nix. Or we would highlight the depth that Penn State has had at running back and receiver already in this short season. However, we are going to start with the kicking game. The Nittany Lions use one player for all punting and kicking duties, Jordan Stout. Through two games this season Stout has 10 punts for 531 yards and he is averaging 53.1 yards per punt. Due to this, he was named Big Ten Special Teams Player of the Week after the Wisconsin game. However, Stout has not been as consistent in his kicking duties.
So far this season he is six-for-seven in extra points made and four-for-six on field goal attempts. Against Wisconsin Stout missed both an extra point and a field goal. Last week against Ball State he improved the extra point percentage, making all five attempts. He did however miss a field goal, going three-for-four. This Saturday will be Stout’s biggest kicking environment yet. There is no concern with his punting, but this game could come down to a field goal. Look for Stout to continue making adjustments and have a much better kicking game this week. Stout has the distance, he just needs to continue to improve the accuracy.
Penn State Penalties
For the second straight game, the Nittany Lions will be without a defensive player to start the game due to a targeting penalty the week before. Last week it was Ellis Brooks. This week it will be safety Tyler Rudolph. The safety finished last week’s game against Ball State second on the team in tackles. While it isn’t ideal to keep being without a defensive playmaker for the first half, Brooks addressed the depth of the defense during a weekly press conference on Tuesday. The senior linebacker stressed how valuable depth is on the defensive side of the ball. He emphasized that it is a good feeling knowing that there are younger players ready to enter the game, “No matter the situation in terms of how you feel on the field, if you need to tap your helmet and get a breather, you know the next man is going to come in and do his job.” The depth shows with 26 different defensive players having a tackle through the first two games. Eight of those 26 have a tackle for loss.
Franklin addressed the need to clean up penalties in his weekly press conference, stating, “There are a couple penalties that we need to get cleaned up, especially the pre-snap and post-snap penalties. Those are the ones that I think you can’t tolerate as head coach.” The Nittany Lions will need to keep as clean of a sheet as possible this weekend against a very good Auburn team. Winning the penalty battle could be a deciding factor in this week’s game.
Takeaways
It will be very important for the Nittany Lions to clean up the kicking game and penalties against Auburn this week. With the tandem of Nix and Tank Bigsby the depth on the Penn State defense will continue to help. Auburn defensive coordinator Derek Mason will likely key in on Jahan Dotson, so while Clifford will need to find ways to get him the ball, the rest of the deep receiving group will need to step up this week. Luckily, Clifford has utilized 10 different receivers throughout the first two games. Look for a close game at the White Out on Saturday.
