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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #10: No Loss November Ends Early for the Nittany Lions
#4 Penn State Nittany Lions 26 – #17 Minnesota Golden Gophers 31 Since joining the Big Ten in 1993, Penn State has headed into the month of November undefeated six times. Only once have they escaped the month still undefeated. Kerry Collins’s 1994 team, which finished the season 12-0 and defeated Oregon in the Rose Bowl, was the only PSU team to leave November with a perfect record. Twenty years and three days ago, an undefeated Minnesota team came to Beaver Stadium to play the #2 Nittany Lions and would upset them 24-23 on a field goal as time expired. I remember the heartbreak on a 4th and forever pass…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #9: No Such Thing as Beginner’s Luck in Fantasy Football
Penn State is off this week so I am giving Jeff the week off from writing. But I wanted to give a brief update on my history with football as well as my rookie season in Fantasy Football. My friend Carson asked me if I would join his Fantasy Football League this year because they needed more people to get it going. I was hesitant at first because not only do I not understand how these fantasy leagues and their rules and scoring systems work, I don’t even understand how football works! However, this summer I decided to make it my mission to try new things. So when the opportunity…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #8: Sparta Has Fallen Along with My 26 Year Drought
#6 Penn State Nittany Lions 28 – Michigan State Spartans 7 On Saturday, Penn State hoped to end a two game losing streak against the Spartans of Michigan State and I hoped to end a 26 year deer hunting drought. The Nittany Lions have lost two straight and five of the last six games against the Spartans and I haven’t shot a deer since the first day of the first year I was eligible to hunt at the very young age of twelve, twenty-six years ago. As Saturday would wind to a close, both streaks would end. Penn State came out victorious and I finally brought down another deer, ending what…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #7: Some White Out Magic & A Sprinkling of Luck
#7 Penn State Nittany Lions 28 – #16 Michigan Wolverines 21 The White Out! A feared name and quite possibly the most electric home game atmosphere in college football. Over 110,000 college football fans clad in all white, energized by all day tailgating create an amazing sight to witness and an even more amazing crowd to be immersed in during a White Out game. I have attended two of these games in previous years. My first White Out game, which was also the very first Penn State game that I ever attended, was in 2008, against Illinois and then again in 2009 against Iowa. Since those first two games, I…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #6: Surviving the Kinnick Graveyard of Ranked Teams
#10 Penn State Nittany Lions 17 – #17 Iowa Hawkeyes 12 Kinnick Stadium. A stripe out. The infamous pink locker room. Primetime on a Saturday night. This creates an atmosphere that inspires fear in ranked teams that visit Iowa. In 2008, I watched as #3 Penn State’s national title hopes were lost on a last second field goal to a 5-4 Hawkeye team. In 2010, #5 Michigan State came to Kinnick and walked out being beaten 37-6. The 2011 season saw #13 Michigan defeated by an unranked Hawkeye team. In 2016, an unranked Iowa team defeated #2 Michigan on a last second field goal, a win that would help set up Penn…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #5: Where Did All the Offense Go?
#12 Penn State Nittany Lions 35 – Purdue Boilermakers 7 Seriously, where did all the offense go? That was the question of the second half at Beaver Stadium for the Nittany Lions yesterday. Scoring on their first four drives and sprinting out to a 28-0 lead with ten minutes to go in the first half, the Lions and their powerful offense were held in check by a Boilermaker defense in the second half before scoring again with six minutes to go in the game. Sean Clifford’s second interception of the year was really the turning point for the offensive shutdown. It seems that this play was enough to give Purdue…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #4: Friday Night Fun
#12 Penn State Nittany Lions 59 – Maryland Terrapins 0 As the Big Ten Conference moves into the second year of Friday night games, I was hoping for a repeat of Penn State’s last season Friday night game which resulted in a 63-24 drubbing of the Fightin’ Illini. What I got was a more impressive drubbing of a Maryland team that considers this game much more of a rivalry than Nittany Lion fans do. Now I will say I have a personal rivalry vested in this game as my best friend is a Terrapin faithful. And although Penn State owns a career record of 40-2-1 against the Turtle, one of those…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #3: An Ugly Win is Still a Win
#13 Penn State Nittany Lions 17 – Pittsburgh Panthers 10 One hundred and twenty-six years of rivalry ended on a rainy day in Beaver Stadium with Penn State clawing, biting, and scratching their way to a 17-10 victory over their bitter in-state rival Pittsburgh. This was the 100th meeting between the two teams and on a lightning delayed rainy day in State College, Penn State will hold the series lead 53-43-4 for the foreseeable future. There are currently no scheduled games between these two teams after the current four game series wrapped up on Saturday. Penn State would go 3-1 against Pitt during the four game series winning the last three. Pitt’s only victory…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #2: Second Half Surge
No ranting about polyamory this week, but if you would like to read more about it, I just shared an article on Medium titled 5 Absurd Myths About Consensual Non Monogamy. Turning it over to Jeff now! #15 Penn State Nittany Lions 45 – Buffalo Bulls 13 After last week’s long Saturday at Penn State, I was extremely happy to be watching college football in the comfortable confines of my living room this week. Not to mention, I would also be able to follow more games outside of my ESPN app. Quite a few games captured my interest yesterday beginning with Army versus Michigan, Clemson versus Texas A.M., LSU versus…
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The Sunday Afternoon Quarterback #1: Polyamorous at Penn State (and Beyond)
Football season is back and with that comes my husband’s enthusiasm for all things Penn State and football related. We started this blog series last year as Shelbee’s Sunday Morning Quarterback, a weekly post where my husband shared college football highlights and I wore something blue and white to represent Penn State. I am rebranding it as the Sunday Afternoon Quarterback because we never could quite get it together and posted before noon on Sundays. While I have no concept about football terms, game rules and regulations, or anything of the sort, I know that there are many women who do understand, follow, and love football. I have joined a…
