Sound, Fury, and Sadness

Having only recently climbed out of my alcohol induced psychosis I will now attempt to give you a two pronged analysis of the PSU game. The first prong will come from the point of view of a booze-addled fan, seated in the student section, and the second prong I will actually take a look at the box scores and see if they tell a different tale.

(I write this first prong having not looked at any box scores whatsoever)
My group and I arrived at our seats about two hours before kick off. I had only consumed several hundred beers as well as several shots in the past six hours. The sun had gone down and so did the temperature, we had excellent seats near midfield and in row 67. Perfectly good seats aside from the fact that it exposed our party to the arctic wind that whistled through Beaver stadium.
As the game started the student section was wildly excited and let loose a solid wall of sound to welcome the buckeyes to the greatest show in college sports. Apparently, the stadium got up to 122 decibels (loud enough to cause pain) but the loudest sustainable sound the stadium produced was 110 decibels. That is still fucking loud. Peep the researchers story here. The Buckeyes were not deterred as they moved the ball for a field goal. However, when PSU put together a drive culminating in a TD to answer the Buckeyes I was filled with hope. The Lions had an early lead and seemed poised to run away with the game. Sadly, that would be the last time the Lions had the lead and so began the death of hope.

Now, I gave the Buckeyes a lot of shit in the days leading up to the game. Specifically, because of the noise prep they had being going through and the recreation of the Lion's roar to ready them for the game. This mockery was, apparently, completely unmerited and misguided as TOSU seemed completely impervious to the cries of a frenzied student section.

During the game it seemed to me that PSU was completely ineffective in the trenches as the Buckeye lines dominated the game as they opened running lanes, protected the QB, and generally disrupted PSU. From the Stands Morelli looked ok, aside from the obviously terrible pick-6 late in the game. The running game was inconsistent but seemed to produce at times.

The defense will bear the brunt of my displeasure. The Defensive line was incapable of getting pressure on Boeckman both by themselves and when the LBs were also blitzing. I only counted one sack for PSU. Dan Connor did not seem effective (aside from the interception near the end of the half. If we only could've gotten seven points on that possession the game may have ended differently. In my opinion, that was the potential turning point in the game. Our inability to get a TD out of that possession spelled PSU's doom.

So sad, I just can't write anymore.

GO STATE BEAT PURDUE!