UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — It’s no secret quarterback Christian Hackenberg’s statistics — 94-of-177 completions (53.1 percent), 1206 yards and eight touchdown passes — aren’t the types of numbers many expected the Nittany Lions’ big-armed junior to post this season.
Penn State’s offense, a unit that is 111th in the Football Bowl Subdivision, isn’t where James Franklin expected it to be in his second season at the helm. Hackenberg’s been asked to play a more conservative style of football, one focused on eliminating turnovers, moving the pocket so he can buy time with a porous offensive line and taking his deep shots only as warranted.
Hackenberg focused on improving his play in the quick passing game since Franklin and his staff arrived and while the numbers this season are not indicative of a kid who once had 392 passing attempts and 20 touchdowns as a freshman in Bill O’Brien’s pro-style offense, through seven games Hackenberg continues to do what he’s asked.
“I just go out and try and execute what I’m being asked to do,” he said Wednesday afternoon on a conference call. “I’m just worrying about making sure I’m the best teammate I can be, both on and off the field, making sure I go out and execute the game plan at the highest level that I can and then being able to go in and give myself a self evaluation and get better each and every week and go out to practice every day and show that I can be able to continue to do that throughout the entire year and just be as consistent as possible. That’s my goal. Whatever is being asked of me it fluctuates throughout games and it is what it is, but just trying to get wins is what we’re all trying to do here and that’s my focus.”
Hackenberg attempted just 13 passes last Saturday during the Lions’ loss to No. 1 Ohio State, and while Penn State’s ground game is rolling behind freshman running back Saquon Barkley, what’s asked of this offense changes with each game plan. It’s a group still searching for an identity and Hackenberg is following through with what he’s asked to do, which through seven games resulted in just two interceptions after he threw 15 a year ago.
He’s also averaging 12 fewer passing attempts per game this season and his 13 attempts against the Buckeyes were a career low.
“What matters is what we’re being asked to do and we need to be able to go out and execute at a high level,” Hackenberg said. “That’s how we all approach it, that’s how I approach it. I know that these coaches are game planning hard each and every week. We’re game planning hard, we’re working hard in the film room, we’re working hard out on the practice field and we’re just trying to win football games. Whatever’s being asked of us we go with that 1000 miles an hour, we make a mistake we move on and we try and get better from it.”
Audrey Snyder: asnyder@post-gazette.com and Twitter @audsnyder4.
First Published: October 21, 2015, 5:20 p.m.