The Penn State defensive front seven is as good as advertised, and the Penn State offensive line is as bad as ?advertised.
In a game in which IU did a lot of things well, the Hoosiers were unable to obtain much success in the category of actually putting up points on ?offense.
When I say unable to obtain much success, I mean the offense didn’t put up any points in IU’s 13-7 defeat against Penn State.
The lone touchdown came from a pick-six by senior safety Mark Murphy in the second quarter.
The defense played a nearly complete game of football. It had two interceptions and held Penn State to 13 total points.
Penn State’s only touchdown came from a 92-yard Bill Belton run. If you take that play out, the Nittany Lions had only 238 yards of offense.
No matter how well the defense plays, though, IU is not going to win these types of games without better ?quarterback play.
Freshman quarterback Zander Diamont threw for a career-high 68 yards Saturday.
Yes, I said career high.
Diamont has improved a lot in his three starts. He looked much more confident as a passer this week, and he also ran for 58 yards.
None of his improvement matters until it translates to productivity.
My thing with Diamont is I don’t even think his potential ceiling is good enough to be a winning Big Ten quarterback, let alone where he stands now.
It is not like there are any other real options, though. Behind him is the injured walk-on Nate Boudreau, a sophomore, and freshman Danny Cameron, who didn’t even start in high school.
The Hoosiers even had to resort to working with freshman safety Zeke Taylor, who played quarterback in high school.
The point is the majority of IU played well Saturday. Running for 153 yards against a Penn State run defense that averages 77 yards a game is respectable.
Defensively, it sacked Penn State quarterback ?Christian Hackenberg five times. They dominated the run game besides that one big Belton run.
The IU passing game was as rough as it was, and it only lost by six.
Maybe just a few more successful passes or maybe one less costly interception, and IU would have won this game.
I wrote at the beginning of the season that the IU defense would just have to be average for IU to have a good season. Obviously a lot has changed, but who would have thought IU’s quarterback play would just have to be average for them to win a game?
There’s a lot to like with this football team but, regardless, it will look bad when it starts 0-5 in conference play.
It is difficult to get a gauge on how this team is as a whole when everything is tainted by how bad the passing game is.
I don’t like saying players are bad. I like saying they are playing badly. Zander Diamont is playing pretty badly.
IU now stands at 3-6, and I don’t foresee that 3 becoming a 4, 5 or 6 if IU can’t even beat Michigan or Penn State.
brodmill@indiana.edu
