Penn State football has won 4 Big Ten titles in 31 seasons. Did you expect Penn State to do better? Would Florida State fare better?

saturdaysarebetter

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Since starting Big Ten Conference play in 1993, Penn State football has won four Big Ten conference titles (1994, 2005, 2008, and 2016), with 1994 and 2008 being the only two seasons Penn State defeated both Michigan and Ohio State in the same season. Did you expect Penn State to have won more Big Ten titles in that time?

With Oregon and USC joining the Big Ten, it will become even more difficult to win a Big Ten conference title. If Florida State joins the Big Ten, how would the Seminoles fare as compared to Penn State?

How has Florida State fared against Big Ten teams?
 

DaytonRickster

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Oct 25, 2021
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Since starting Big Ten Conference play in 1993, Penn State football has won four Big Ten conference titles (1994, 2005, 2008, and 2016), with 1994 and 2008 being the only two seasons Penn State defeated both Michigan and Ohio State in the same season. Did you expect Penn State to have won more Big Ten titles in that time?

With Oregon and USC joining the Big Ten, it will become even more difficult to win a Big Ten conference title. If Florida State joins the Big Ten, how would the Seminoles fare as compared to Penn State?

How has Florida State fared against Big Ten teams?
Definitely expected more.
 

olelion

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Oct 31, 2021
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I thought they would win many more based on my expectation the Paterno would retire after the 1994 season (having successfully joined the Big ten and becoming champions). New leadership and staff going forward to keep pace with the changes in the game. It didn't happen
 

dcf4psu

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Oct 25, 2021
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I don't know. My sister always gave me grief, but back after 1994 I really thought Paterno should have retired. How many Big 10 championships would Penn State have won if they'd joined before Paterno became head coach in the mid 60's?
 

s1uggo72

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Oct 12, 2021
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I expected them to win many more, especially with JVP at the helm providing needed experience.
 

BiochemPSU

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Oct 30, 2021
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There was no way this program was going to rise to a significant number of BIG titles with Paterno after 2000. For numerous reasons, his hanging on for too long just made it impossible. O'Brien was a good short-term transition towards bringing the program up to the modern age. But he wasn't in this for the long-term and sanctions made it impossible to realistically compete, so that wasn't going to happen under him. Franklin did a good job of stopping the on field performance slide post-sanctions. He brought PSU back to the point where we now beat all of the programs that we should; you can circle all of the wins pre-season and be 95 to 100% correct by the end of the season. However, the program just treads water now and can't realistically compete with OSU for BIG titles. It lacks the killer, innovative, top of his era coach (Meyer, Saban, Dabo) or the Tebow, Vick, Winston type QB who just puts the team on his back and elevates the whole program. Franklin's window to show that he could recruit or produce that kind of a QB shut when Fields backed out of his commitment. He somehow got another shot with Allar, but so far that isn't going the way we all hoped it would. Time will tell.

FSU is an interesting question. Miami and UF are always going to take their share of in-state talent. Geographically, Bama and Clemson and (now Georgia) just kill them with the amount of winning they have done. It's the equivalent of us being stuck in the same division as OSU and Michigan year after year. If they moved to the BIG and started to beat OSU and Michigan (which I don't think they would be able to do with much consistency), they may start to be able to acquire a better quality player from around their immediate area or convince more northern kids to come south to fill the gap.
 
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Bob78

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Oct 12, 2021
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Yes, I absolutely expected more B1G football titles from 1993-2011 than the 3 we did win. Joe did warn the alumni and fans that the overall level of competition was going to be more of a challenge, which he embraced. Most of us just didn't buy it! Still, after '94, the idea of trips to Pasadena every 2 or 3 years seemed reasonable.

The whole game and strategies and skill talent is different and more equitable across the top end of most all conferences. Finding a longer run of conference dominance is trending toward being more rare, imo. There will be a few teams who win 2 of 3 or 3 of 4 within their conference. But xfers, conference title games, longer playoff series, all indicate more upsets for any variety of reasons. That means back-to-back championships could/should be more rare.
 

cmentheadcra k

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Sep 23, 2021
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Yes, I absolutely expected more B1G football titles from 1993-2011 than the 3 we did win. Joe did warn the alumni and fans that the overall level of competition was going to be more of a challenge, which he embraced. Most of us just didn't buy it! Still, after '94, the idea of trips to Pasadena every 2 or 3 years seemed reasonable.

The whole game and strategies and skill talent is different and more equitable across the top end of most all conferences. Finding a longer run of conference dominance is trending toward being more rare, imo. There will be a few teams who win 2 of 3 or 3 of 4 within their conference. But xfers, conference title games, longer playoff series, all indicate more upsets for any variety of reasons. That means back-to-back championships could/should be more rare.
I apologize.
 
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cmentheadcra k

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Sep 23, 2021
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I expected more of the program coming out of the 1997 season.

The “Dark” years were worse than the 2 years of sanctions. Bill O’Brien is the second best PSU FB coach.
 

Mufasa94

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Oct 12, 2021
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Expected more when PSU first joined and had really high hopes for the upcoming years heading into ‘97. By the end of ‘99 was convinced greatness wouldn’t happen again under the then current staff and settled into just waiting for the change to occur.

The Sandusky thing happened and hopes were non-existent. Finally got them up again heading into ‘17 and that was the blown opportunity of greatness and a potential positive snowball effect. Kind of settled into an it is what it is until proven otherwise.

No idea about how FSU will do. Shame how many players quit on their team when they still had a chance to finish with a great season in their bowl. As mad as I was about how PSU’s bowl went, don’t know what I’d feel with how FSU’s went.
 

BobPSU92

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Oct 12, 2021
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I expected more of the program coming out of the 1997 season.

The “Dark” years were worse than the 2 years of sanctions. Bill O’Brien is the second best PSU FB coach.

Except that Franklin laughs at FLO. o_O .