'Close won't cut it' for Penn State in latest Ohio State loss; Lions, Sean Clifford face criticism: What they're saying
Penn State is coping with another loss to Ohio State. The Lions followed a familiar script against the Buckeyes. They led in the fourth quarter but didn’t make enough big plays late to hang on. OSU won by a 44-31 margin.
“It’s tough,” Lions quarterback Sean Clifford said.
“It really is. You put everything into this game, and when it doesn’t go your way obviously it’s going to be hard so it’s just about feeling the hurt. There’s nothing wrong with that, and then getting back tomorrow, watching film, and getting better.”
Added tight end Theo Johnson:
“It’s tough. It really is. You put everything into this game, and when it doesn’t go your way obviously it’s going to be hard so it’s just about feeling the hurt. There’s nothing wrong with that, and then getting back tomorrow, watching film, and getting better.”
Here is what is being said locally and nationally after the Lions’ loss.
‘The Sean Clifford experience’
As expected, Clifford received plenty of blame following the setback. He threw three interceptions and also lost a fumble.
“This game pretty much epitomized Clifford’s Penn State career. He looked really good at times and was a big reason why the Lions were in position to win,” Cory Giger writes for DKPittsburgh Sports “But then, he made big mistakes that wound up being a big reason the team lost. It’s why so many people have taken to calling it “the Sean Clifford experience.”
“Had Clifford beaten Ohio State, hey, Penn State could have been in position for a College Football Playoff berth. That would have changed a whole lot of things in how we view Clifford. But now? He is who we thought he was. Average. Up and down. Not terribly reliable. And that’s how he’ll always be remembered.”
Talent or coaching?
That was the question Statecollege.com’s Ben Jones tried to answer following another season in which the Lions had a chance to beat the Buckeyes but fell apart to lose instead.
“It’s how close Penn State has gotten which truly haunts James Franklin and creates a Rorschach test for his tenure in State College,” Jones writes. “Are the Nittany Lions talented enough but not well coached? Are they lacking comparable talent to Ohio State and coached up to the point of making this series competitive? Would better facilities lead to better recruits or would better coaching lead to better recruits?
Is Ohio State simply so good as a program that it carries with it an inherent ability to get up off the mat and land the knockout blows no matter how the rest of the game has gone? Was Franklin in fact deft enough at the minor details, people management and relationship fostering required for truly top shelf program building that he can ever go from great to elite? Is Penn State never really going to be Ohio State because the Buckeyes’ monopoly on the conference is too big to overcome and Michigan too well positioned to play spoiler?
“It depends what you choose to see, but the answer is likely in one shape or another — as James Franklin often says when asked about the steps his program needs to take to get to the next level — all of it.”
‘This was Sean Clifford’s biggest missed opportunity
This was the take of PennLive’s Johnny McGonigal in his weekly takeaways piece. As many others have written, said, or thought, it goes without saying that the sixth-year Lion and fourth-season starting quarterback would forever be viewed much differently if he won this game.
“Credit to the defense for responding to sudden-change scenarios after Clifford’s two first-quarter picks,” McGonigal writes. “The deficit could have been much worse than 10-0. And credit to Clifford, as well, for responding to those early turnovers. It may not feel like it, but he made some gutty throws to give the Nittany Lions a chance.
“But you can’t dig your own hole against Ohio State, and you can’t end your own comeback bid late in the fourth quarter with a pick-six. Unfortunately for Clifford, that’s what most will remember from Saturday’s loss.”
The gap between Penn State and Ohio State showed up
In his first impressions piece, BWI publisher Sean Fitz covered obvious ground that had to be discussed: The gap between Penn State and Ohio State showed up again in the fourth quarter.
“Penn State outplayed Ohio State for 51 minutes on Saturday afternoon,” Fitz writes. “There’s zero questioning the effort and the Nittany Lions were right there, yet again. The difference between the two sides — between the two programs as a whole — showed up in that last nine minutes, once again. As James Franklin often alludes to, it’s everything.
“On Saturday, though, it couldn’t be needled down to dorms or the weight room, it wasn’t the giant wave of NIL that will further the gap between the haves and the have-nots in college football. It was just simply everything.”
