MVN - Most Valuable Network

Blue-White Roundtable

This week’s questions come from JB at There Is No Name On My Jersey and the rest of the responses can be found here:

Black Shoe Diaries
Run Up the Score
The Nittany Line
There Is No Name on My Jersey
William Yurasko

Criminal allegations swirl around the squad; what impact will this have on the team? My own fall off of my high-horse-of-PSU’s-sterling-reputation has been terrible, have you experienced the same?

Well recent years have certainly been leading up to this (the ice rink fight, Arrowgate, Dan Connor’s prank phone calls, etc.) but this year it has really become clear that Joe has lost control of the team. I mean this is absolutely ridiculous. These aren’t even the minor incidents like the prank phone calls anymore. Austin Scott has a major allegation pending against him. Four different players have been cited for underage drinking. Now even Joe could be in trouble if this road rage incident turns out to be true. Losing football games is one thing but I don’t see Spanier and the rest of the administration standing for crap like this. At what point does he say enough is enough? This is beginning to get out of hand.

Evan Royster provided Penn State with the Spark it needed to get going on Saturday, did he win himself the starting job? If not, how does your depth chart read at RB and why?

Despite the fact that Rodney Kinlaw statistically out-performed him against Iowa it was very clear that Royster is the best running back Penn State has on the team with or without Austin Scott. He’s much closer to being a complete back than either Scott or Kinlaw is and he’s only a redshirt freshman. He has the ability to pound it up the middle but he can also take it to the outside and break off a long run. And unlike Kinlaw and Scott who carry the ball like it’s an antique vase, Royster secures the ball. The best thing for PSU to do right now is start Royster and use Kinlaw as a change of pace back. However, if Scott really isn’t coming back I would like to see Stephfon Green take off the redshirt and see some playing time. He sounds like a player that could really energize the offense.

Anthony Morelli gets it done while looking both awful and excellent in the same game. What the hell is PSU supposed to do at QB?

I’d hardly say Morelli “gets it done.” He single-handedly cost the team wins against Michigan and Illinois. If Joe wasn’t going to make a change after the Illinois debacle he certainly isn’t going to make one after a 20-point win over Iowa. That being said I really think Pat Devlin and/or Daryll Clark really need to start seeing some serious playing time. We all saw how 2006 went with an inexperienced QB and Morelli had seen way more time than Clark or Devlin has up to this point. At least one of them should be getting a series or two every game, especially now that nothing big is likely to come of this season.

Lightning Round
What games are you watching on Saturday?

Probably will check out Illinois at Iowa since there aren’t any more compelling games on early and then Missouri-Oklahoma after the Penn State-Wisconsin game. It’s a pretty lackluster week for college football.

What are your predictions for the second half of the season?

I don’t know what to think of this team. I could see them winning out and going 10-2 or I could see them losing the rest except Temple and finishing 5-7. This week will really tell us where the team is at. A win probably means no worse than 9-3. A loss could be devastating. I’ll go with 9-3 and a trip to Outback Bowl for now.

Who will be PSU’s MVP come January?

Jeremy Boone

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 9th, 2007 at 2:37 pm and is filed under The Nittany Notebook. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.