Penn State is headed to the Outback Bowl.
It’s official: The Nittany Lions will face off with the University of Florida on Jan. 1 at Raymond James Stadium. Kickoff is set for 1 p.m.
In today’s edition of Morelli OnLion, we’ll take a look at the matchup between the Nittany Lions and Gators.
On to the Outback
The 7-5 Nittany Lions will face the equally disappointing Gators, who also finished the season at 7-5. It’s an unlikely pairing of Penn State legendary head coach Joe Paterno and the Gators’ Urban Meyer, who nearly retired due to some health issues last season.
Outback Bowl execs are thrilled to have the Paterno/Meyer matchup.
“When you talk about tradition and history of college football, it just doesn’t get any better than Penn State and the University of Florida,” said Outback Bowl CEO/president Jim McVay.
The Lions and Gators will receive $3.4 million for playing in the contest. Not bad considering neither team has the credentials to be playing on New Year’s Day. For Paterno, the trip to a bowl game will be his 37th in 45 seasons. JoePa is 24-11-1 in bowl games, including 17-7 on New Year’s Day.
Penn State rolls into Tampa with a 7-5 overall record, including a 4-4 mark in the Big Ten. The Lions ended the 2010 regular season in a three-way tie for fourth place in the conference with Iowa and Illinois. It was Penn State’s worst season under Paterno in six years.
Meyer leads the Gators into the game with the best winning percentage (103-23, .817) among active coaches. It was definitely a down year for Meyer and the Gators, who won BCS national titles in 2006 and 2008, respectively.
Penn State will be facing an SEC opponent in the postseason for the third time in five seasons. Penn State rallied to defeat LSU, 19-17, in the Capital One Bowl in Orlando. In the Lions’ last Outback Bowl appearance, they defeated Tennessee, 20-10, on Jan. 1, 2007.
Paterno said that he’s concerned with Florida’s speed.
“The one thing that just comes at you is the speed,” Paterno said during a recent teleconference. “I don’t think we can match their speed. Obviously we’re going to have to be in good position. We can’t miss tackles. We’ve gotta do some things, as Urban mentioned earlier, the kicking game has gotta be solid. We can’t afford to turn it over and give them field position. We’ve gotta play a good, solid football game.”
That means the Lions won’t be able to fall behind as they did in losses to Alabama, Iowa, Illinois and Michigan State. It also means the Lions need to avoid a collapse as they did in a loss to Ohio State.
Paterno said that the Gators remind him of a team the Lions have already faced this season.
“We played at Alabama our second game,” Paterno recalled. “They’re very similar to them in the sense of the way they run not only on offense but the way they run on defense. I think the difference between Alabama and Florida right now is that at that time, Alabama was very comfortable with their quarterback situation.”
As usual, Penn State will head to Florida sometime before Christmas to escape the cold temperatures in Happy Valley. The Lions will have several practices in the Sunshine State. Penn State has not announced the practice schedule yet, but that is expected to be released in the next week or so.
“As far as our practice plans, we’ve worked two days. We worked last Friday and Saturday. We’re going to work this Friday and Saturday. And then, we’ll probably go,” Paterno said. “Right now, we have a couple of people down in the Tampa Bay area looking at some places we might stay. If we can find a place that we’re comfortable with, even if it’s down in Clearwater for a couple of days, we’ll probably go down that way because it’s tough for us to get outside when it’s … this morning it was 23 degrees up here.
“We have a great indoor facility, but that’s still not the same as being outside and working on your passing game and the kicking game and things like that. So we probably are going to practice four or five days up here and then go down and practice another six, seven, eight days when we get into Florida.”
Here’s hoping that the Penn State brass books a hotel as close to the practice facility as it can. In the past, Paterno has gotten quite testy when he’s been forced to bus to a facility a little further than he’d like. In the loss to USC in the Rose Bowl a few years back, he said that the commute to the practice facility ultimately led to his team’s demise in a 38-20 loss to Pete Carroll’s Trojans.
Going to the Outback Bowl has to be considered a victory of sorts for the Lions. After starting the season 3-3, an injury forced the Lions to go to former walk-on Matt McGloin. He helped salvage the Lions’ season, despite losses to Ohio State and MSU. Paterno said that McGloin will get the nod on New Year’s Day.
“I think Matt is our quarterback. Now, the other kid’s got a lot of ability, but he’s a true freshman in the truest sense of the word. He wasn’t even here for spring practice,” Paterno noted. “He came in and unfortunately, we had to start him a couple of games early until the other kid started to show some promise. I think we’re all right at quarterback. We’re not great.”
Paterno is correct. The Lions are not great, in fact, they’re just OK. Luckily, they’re matched up with another 7-5 squad.
In the coming weeks, we will take a closer look at the matchups. The week before the big game, we’ll have our final prediction of the year.
Chris Morelli is an award-winning writer/editor who lives in Centre County and covers Penn State athletics. He is also a regular on “Sports Central,” which airs on ESPN Radio in Altoona and State College. E-mail him at morellionlion@gmail.com. Also, be sure to check out Morelli OnLion on Facebook!