Northwestern University Athletics
The Skip Report: Penn State Preview
9/26/2014 12:00:00 AM | Football
Skip Myslenski's weekly Friday post previews Saturday's opponent, the undefeated Penn State Nittany Lions, with a few additional nuggets from Northwestern practice this week.
AGAINST CAL, in their season open, the 'Cats threw 44 times and rushed 36. A week later, against Northern Illinois, they threw 43 times and rushed 37. But then, against a Western Illinois defense that had held Wisconsin star Melvin Gordon to just 38 yards on 17 carries, they threw only 25 times and rushed 41 for 166 net yards (92 of them by Justin Jackson). "I hope we build on what we did," Pat Fitzgerald said this week, looking ahead to his team's Saturday Big Ten opener at Penn State.
"We wanted to really work our tail off to run the football against a team that we thought (had done a good job) against arguably one of the best rushing offenses in the country. We thought Western's front and the way they did things was going to be very challenging, and we wanted to challenge our guys on Saturday. I think our guys learned a lot from that."
"We want to be a full-and-complete offense," said superback Dan Vitale, explaining that approach. "We don't have to throw the ball every single play to win. We want to be able to do a little bit of everything. I've worked on my blocking a ton the last two years and I feel I've gotten a lot better. It showed in the last game, for sure, when we were primarily running the ball out of a power set."
THAT POWER SET can include not only Vitale, but also his fellow superbacks Jayme Taylor and Garrett Dickerson. The former, a 230-pound redshirt freshman, is cut from the same mold as Vitale, who himself is 235 and most acclaimed as a receiver. But Dickerson, a 250-pound true freshman, is from a different mold all together.
"He's a bigger guy, more of a true tight end," says Vitale. "He has the body of a Big Ten tight end. So to have Garrett out there to run some power and have some real tight-end sets, it's nice to have a guy like that. We're still generally a spread offense. But we want to be a complete football team and do everything. We have the personnel to do that now, so we're going to take advantage of it."
"We really haven't had a true tight end before me," says Dickerson himself. "So I think I can step in and be that guy that can block on the edge, be a physical player up front, kind of bring something new to the offense, something we really haven't had before from what I've seen."
ANY OFFENSE'S GOAL, of course, is to be complete, is to be able to run the ball with the same efficiency that it throws it. That is why this trio of superbacks is critically important to the `Cats hopes against the Nittany Lions, whose defense last week held Massachusetts to just three net rushing yards on 28 attempts (that averages out to 0.1 yard-per-carry). On the season, in addition, it has surrendered an average of just 49.5 rushing yards per-game (tops in the nation) and a mere 11 points per-game (tops in the Big Ten and sixth in the nation). "I think their defense is ridiculous," says Fitzgerald. "I think their defense is really good."
COMPOUNDING THE DIFFICULTY here is the Happy Valley setting, which Vitale vividly recalls from his visit there in 2012. He was a true freshman that season, and the then-undefeated `Cats entered the fourth quarter of that game up 11 before falling by 11. "I remember how loud it got in that stadium when they started coming back," he says. "As a freshman, the nerves started -- that was the first time I was ever actually nervous on a football field.
"Even my first game playing college, even in high school, I don't think I was ever that nervous before. With a little bit more experience now, you're ready to rise to that challenge. We've played in big place before, and I expect our young guys to understand the situation as well. Like I said, that was the loudest place I've ever played in. I sure as hell hope it's loud again. That was pretty cool."
"It's something you definitely have to mentally prepare for, and even if you prepare for it, it's going to be different once you get there," says Justin Jackson, a true freshman now just as Vitale was then. "I've never been in a stadium with 110,000 people, but I'm looking forward to it. It's exciting. That's what we live for. So once it happens, I'm going to look up, I'm going to take a second to take it in, then I'm going to play football.
"It comes down to just playing football. I know it's going to definitely be a live atmosphere. But the older guys are telling me, `Be calm, go in there, you know our game plan.'"
QUICKLY NOTED:
• The youthful Jackson has been the revelation of this young season and enters Saturday's game as the `Cats leading rusher, averaging 61.3 yards-per-game. Still, he says, "Each game, I just want to keep proving myself. So I'm not going to lean on the last two or three games, I'm not going to lean on the last game. This is a whole new game and it's Big Ten play, it's the first time I'll play a Big Ten team. So I really want to go out there and prove myself."
• The undefeated Nittany Lions, much like the `Cats, are running-back-by-committee and none of their three primary rushers is averaging more then 41 ypg. But they possess a lethal weapon in quarterback Christian Hackenberg, a 6-foot-4, 234-pound sophomore who is already acclaimed as a future first-round draft choice. He has completed 60.7 percent of his passes (91-of-150) for a Big Ten best 1,261 yards and also leads the conference in total offense while averaging 322.5 ypg.
"He's as good as anybody in the country," Fitzgerald says of him. "His mobility in the pocket, he's got great escapability. I think he's a very good athlete watching him on tape. They're not an option team. But he's a very good athlete for a big young man, and he can make every throw. There's not a throw he can't make. He's always got his eyes up and he's always got his eyes down the field. He's a pro. He's a good player. We'll be seeing him on Saturday for a few more years, and then Sunday. And then he's got really talented weapons on the perimeter."
• The most dangerous of those weapons are DeaSean Hamilton, who has 30 catches for 402 yards, and Geno Lewis, who has 25 for 462.
• The disrupter of the Nittany Lion defense is 6-foot-4, 274-pound tackle Anthony Zettel, who has three sacks and seven tackles-for-loss. "A terrific football player," Fitzgerald says of him. "He's a dominant football player."
AND FINALLY, on a lighter note, this from Justin Jackson, who has been asked if he still feels like a freshman: "Sometimes, yeah. Obviously, it's an honor and a privilege to be able to play my first year. But I definitely still have my freshman moments, so you've just got to take the embarrassment, shake it off and keep moving."
A freshman moment?
"My first week, I showed up in full pads and everyone else is like, `Why do you have full pads on?' Had to go back and change, run back. Now it's all good. I still have moments, but they're not as severe as before."
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