UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – When Penn State’s game against Michigan State began Saturday afternoon, a repeat of 2017 was the Nittany Lions’ worst nightmare.
By early evening, it had become their best-case scenario.
The Spartans, coming off a humbling 10-point loss at home to Northwestern, became the latest opponent to overcome a deficit in the closing minutes of the fourth quarter and beat Penn State, 21-17.
The Nittany Lions (4-2) have been ahead late in each of their past five defeats, including a 27-26 home loss to Ohio State two weeks earlier.
What’s more, they have dropped back-to-back games against the Buckeyes and Spartans for the second year in a row.
Last year, they rebounded with four consecutive victories, but duplicating that will be a challenge for a team that has absorbed another soul-crushing setback.
Especially when so many of the Nittany Lions’ problems were self-inflicted.
They kept several Michigan State drives – including the ones that yielded the Spartans’ first two touchdowns – alive with third-down penalties, missed a 37-yard field goal, were victimized by a fake punt and, most painful of all, squandered a chance to abort the game-winning drive when cornerback Amani Oruwariye failed to catch a pass that Michigan State quarterback Brian Lewerke threw directly at him.
“We made way too many mistakes,” said running back Miles Sanders.
Lewerke made the most of his reprieve and a few plays later, capped a 76-yard drive with a 25-yard scoring pass to Felton Davis with 19 seconds remaining.
Oruwariye, who was covering Davis on the game-deciding play, was predictably despondent when the game ended, but coach James Franklin and his teammates were quick to defend him.
“He’s made huge play after huge play after huge play in our program and will continue to do that,” Franklin said. “I love Amani. Wouldn’t trade him for anybody.”
This defeat stung Penn State as much as any in recent history, and cost them more than most.
When quarterback Trace McSorley’s final pass in a sub-par performance for him was batted down as time expired, Penn State’s hopes of qualifying for the national championship playoff field were gone.
So were the Nittany Lions’ long shot chances of winning their second Big Ten title in three years.
Along with any possibility McSorley had of earning Penn State’s second-ever Heisman Trophy, even though it happened on a day when he broke Christian Hackenberg’s school record of 8,457 passing yards.
McSorley, who hit on 19 of 32 passes and netted 37 rushing yards, accepted responsibility for the loss.
“I didn’t execute right,” he said. “I didn’t do enough of a good job to get the job done in the passing game. That’s on me.”
Although Michigan State entered the game with the nation’s top-ranked run defense, Penn State bludgeoned it for 205 yards on 32 carries. Miles Sanders accounted for 162 of those, including a 78-yarder and a 48-yard touchdown run.
“We ran the ball well on offense, against a team that hadn’t been giving up more than 33 yards a game,” Franklin said. “But we weren’t able to throw the ball well against a team that had been giving up a bunch of yards all year long.”
For all their shortcomings, the Nittany Lions never trailed until Michigan State got the game-winning touchdown, and Oruwariye’s botched interception attempt was just the most glaring of their squandered opportunities to escape this game with a victory.
“We had a chance to put them away several times,” Franklin said. “On offense, on defense and on special teams, and we didn’t do it.”
Which, by this time, must be sounding – and feeling – agonizingly familiar to his team.
Dave Molinari: Dmolinari@Post-Gazette.com and Twitter @MolinariPG
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First Published: October 13, 2018, 11:39 p.m.
Updated: October 14, 2018, 1:52 a.m.