I Can’t Believe Penn State Football Is THIS BAD...

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1:00at $555 and 55 seconds. Hit it! When you need a team that will do whatever it takes on game day, it matters where you stay. Hilton for this day. I'm just in the state of shock with how bad this team is. You are locked on Nittany Lions. Your daily podcast on the Penn State Nittany Lions. Part of the Lockdown podcast network. Your team every day. They're that bad. My name is Zach Seiko. Your host is always. It's after 1 a.m. When I'm recording this. Thank you for joining me here. Just so you're you're getting my most transparent thoughts about this team after straight up embarrassment against out of Ohio state. North Western. There's a lot of blame to go around. We'll get to that. I just I still have so much

2:01to get off my chest as far as what an awful game that was because there is no positive takeaway from that except Tony Rojas is good football. That's about it. Tony Rojas is a good player. Everything else from coaching execution, talent issues. But I never thought it would be this bad. Right. It's one thing to just be out muscled and out talented. Buy the Ohio state buck eyes and the organ ducks. You made the Northwestern wild cats. Look like Ohio state and maybe it was something in the air. Right. With the the new stadium opening. 100 years later to the date. Maybe it was just something in the air. No, it wasn't. It was poor preparation. Poor execution. No chemistry symmetry.

3:02What's so ever. Just I don't think I don't think the Iowa state guys. Coaches players included. They realize that they're in the big tent. You should expect them to struggle there. It's a bunch of Iowa state players. Maybe you're right at the end of the day. Maybe you are right. But it looks like they're just surprised at the increase in competition. That this. We're not in Kansas anymore. We're not at Iowa state anymore. We're not. It doesn't even look like they're processing that. Oh, this is the big 10 that. Oh, guys are this physical. That there's another degree to it. That's what I'm talking about. So it's not just a talent. Yes, sure. Guys can be less talented than most of their big 10 counterparts right now. But it's the fact that. You're not even looking at this like a step up in competition that we've

4:03seen this before we've been here before it's college football. No, it's the big 10. It's the big 10. And you're having guys. Who are veterans just just make the worst mistakes possible? Where do I begin? Where do I begin? You have the most experienced quarterback in college football missing wide open receivers. Multiple times throughout the game. Literally lay ups for touchdowns. You have guys who are experienced. Linebackers and defenders where the Northwestern running backs are just bouncing off of you. It's practically pinball out there. So what's worse? You're offense not being able to score more than 13 points. And. That final touchdown coming in literal garbage time. Because like I said, there's blame to go around everywhere. What we'll get to specifically whom.

5:04But seven points. And then you get the touchdown late in garbage time. So this the score doesn't even truly reflect kind of does. But it doesn't even truly reflect how badly Penn State was beaten. And then because I'm a Zach, you're being too hard on the offense. Look at the defense. Oh, I know. Oh, I know about the defense. 400 rushing yards to Northwestern. 500 yards of total offense. And Chip Kelly didn't do anything elaborate or any triple option. The triple option. Full back dive telegraphed right right at the defense. And Penn State do it. This is why every every party because it's yes. One guy isn't making the tackles. But what adjustments are you making to stop? The simplest of plays.

6:05I mean, do you do you see this? On screen. Two running backs. One almost went for 200. Another one went over 150. So you had two backs for Northwestern goal over 150 yards each. 55. 55 yards or 55 attempts. 413 yards for touchdowns. And Northwestern who gave up 200 yards. Every game at 200 yards on average. And gave up 200 to one individual running back at Indiana. And you couldn't even muster up 50. Rocco backed missing wide open pass catchers. So because the coaches can't do that. And she said, OK, well, Matt Campbell didn't have the team prepared. No, they he didn't. He didn't have the team prepared. Taylor Mauser's not calling the right plays.

7:06Dan Linn's not making adjustments. At Dan Linn can't make a tackle in the in the gap. Dan Linn isn't. What can Dan Linn do when the defensive tackles getting blown off the play for 10 yards downfield? What is Matt Campbell and Taylor Mauser supposed to do when Z Robinson wins on a double move? And Rocco back just air mails it over his head. And it's not even contested coverage or you could have placed the ball a little better. It's it's not even close. You don't even give him a chance. On an easy third down pitch and catch. Andrew Rapley is wide open. And you wait for the defensive back to make a move. Northwestern had 24 hours more to prepare. And it literally felt like they had 24 days. That's why I'm in the state of shock because that the haters were right, I guess.

8:11But how did Dan Linn have a top 10 defense at UCLA? And you keep key assistance on this staff. You have Terry Smith. You go get some other smart defensive minds. You can Maloy Tyson bite right. That's a solid defensive staff. Offensive staff a little bit of a different story. They're inexperienced. Okay. So it's understandable. And one player gets hurt. Your best offensive player. But the offense totally falls apart without him. I could understand a middle of the road team that hey, OK, 758 and 4. And this schedule was very favorable. We know that much. But now. Does Penn State even go 500? Do they even beat a Minnesota or do we want to even say Maryland, producer? Surely they'll beat Maryland or Purdue. I don't know at this point.

9:14But I'm stunned because we were told, right? Matt Campbell's a great in game coach. I'm a motor motivator discipline. And I haven't seen any of that. It's the stuff that we had talked about and that we were told about all off season. Hey, this is what you're going to get from a Matt Campbell football team. And I haven't seen the in game adjustments. I have been seen the physicality. They're playing scared. I just don't. I think there there's an element of nervousness to it where it's everywhere. It's from the head coach down to the players that again, you're missing basic throws. You're not making basic tackles. Who's to blame? Who's to blame for Penn State? Yeah, at least being in the, you know, above average, offer part of the big tent.

10:17You know, Ohio State or whomever's at the top of the big 10 on a year by your basis, but at least they're good. And he said, this is a bad team. This is a really bad team. And again, I don't, I can't guarantee anything. I can't say, well, Penn State should win that by two touchdowns. I don't know. We've seen some of the worst losses in Penn State history. And not at the hands of Ohio State and not at the hands of Oregon or whomever else in the big tent. Again, the powers that be in the big tent. The pack. Teams at best Northwesterns good. I think Northwestern is a decent team. They could finish eight and four, something like that Wisconsin's got a good defense, but that's about it. They're middle of the pack teams. And. You've really only put up seven legitimate points on offense. Are you actually drove down the field and scored? It's been a huge loss. And it's been a tough time. I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to get up to a first chapter. Garbage time or the defense.

11:18Set me up. First and goal. Something like that. So who is to blame, right? Cause I'm kind of teasing it that. Oh, you know, maybe the offense isn't doing enough, but four four hundred yards of rushing from from Northwestern. Inexcuseable. We'll get to that more. And next year on, not going to netting lines. And do a welcome to the most rewarding football season yet with Fandall the action on the field already gives us enough to talk about every week and now Fandall is adding even more to the experience with the all new Fandall rewards club. The idea is pretty simple here. If you're already checking Fandall throughout the football season, now there's even more reason to open up the app and see what's available to you. The Fandall rewards club features exclusive offers, surprises and rewards throughout the season. So each week, there could be something new waiting for you. It adds another layer to the way you already follow football, whether you're checking lines or looking at a matchup or seeing what's happening around the league. So instead of Fandall just being somewhere you go to check the odds,

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14:23it matters where you stay. Hilton for this day. Okay, who's to blame for all of this? Mac Campbell, coaches, Dan Lynn, the coordinators, right? Rocco Becht? It's the quarterback after all. And missing missing what should be easy throws for a fifth year, most experienced quarterback in all of college football. That's not even the direction I'm going to go in initially here. Pat Kraft. Pat Kraft deserves blame here because I actually can't put it all on Mac Campbell. Right? When we're talking big picture. Okay. In a in a vacuum, yes, Northwestern, your team doesn't look prepared and gets blown out. Again, look at the stats 34 to 13 here. Yes, Mac Campbell bears responsibility because that was a lack of preparedness by by all parties. So that falls on the head coach. But how did Penn State get

15:25here? And it's not well, Pat Kraft was wrong for firing James Franklin. I'm not even I'm not even going to that. It's the fact that you had no plan if you were going to do that. If you were going to fire James Franklin, you need a better plan than we're putting all of our eggs into the basket of Kalani Sataki. We don't have the phone number for Mac Campbell and his agent. Yet we were lucky enough to hire him anyway, because I still think Mac Campbell's a good coach. And with the proper support, we'll be just fine at Penn State. So it starts there because Mac Campbell is now behind the eight ball because of that coaching search. 2026 recruiting class falls apart. Transfer portal. You get a late start on the transfer portal because I do wonder if Mac Campbell could have had a couple more conversations, you know, what other players you're maybe

16:27able to get or just what you're able to do in terms of generating some NIL, right? Mac Campbell was trying to tie down so many loose ends getting to Penn State. So that's why I don't put it all in the long term scheme of things. Mac, Mac Campbell gets a pass here. Okay. But at the same time, you did, this is a $30 million roster after all. And now is again, did Mac Campbell have to settle and spend money where where he thought was best to an extent? Yes. But it ultimately was his decision along with the, you know, general manager, Derek Hoosier to say, hey, this is how we're going to construct the roster. We feel good about this. You brought over most of your assistants from Iowa State. You kept Terry Smith. Okay, that's a win. Terry Smith has always a guy you keep on staff.

17:28Dan Lynn, I still like that. I still want him as a defensive coordinator. But, you know, hey, it is Mac Campbell's team and his program after all. And this is a favorable schedule. Again, the Wisconsin, there are coaching issues with blowing a 17 to nothing lead. It can only be execution so much, right? You have to put your players in position to succeed. But long term, I'm going to give Mac Campbell a pass. And I'm still going to give him three, four, five years, unless it looks absolutely terrible where you're going, you know, two and 10, something like that. Gosh, I hope that doesn't happen. But Pat Kraft has started with, it starts with him. Yeah. Because it affects Mac Campbell and how this, how it's not about keeping or not keeping James Franklin. It's about how you handled his replacement. And that's why Penn State is behind. We're just seeing it now show up. Rocco Becht is a good leader. He looks like a, you know, disciplined. He understands the work

18:38ethic that goes into all of this. And that sounds great. But if it doesn't translate into into victories, then what, what good is any of it? Becht, that's the nervousness on full display. And this was supposed to, and people are human. I'm human. You're human. Rocco Becht is human. He's going to make mistakes. At the same time, you are being paid now millions of dollars. So a mistake here and there in crunch time, you know, that's understandable. And I'm willing to, you know, give a pass at the end of the day. But you were brought in to be, you know, the leader to, you know, unite both sides of the Penn State Iowa State conglomerate, right, to build this team out together. And the, the feedback that I got from the Wisconsin game that, hey, Matt Campbell and

19:47Taylor Mauser had to scheme around you because they couldn't trust you. You watched the game back and you noticed it. It's why is, why is Penn State running the football in third and 12? Because they don't trust that they, they can't trust that their quarterbacks going to deliver a pass. It's more than that, the offensive line sometimes doesn't hold up in protection. Kobe Howard being out, right, but one, one player really shouldn't break the offense. It really shouldn't. And it's the, it's the layups. Again, it's, it's a third, it's an easy pitch and catch, third down conversion. It's missing a player up the seam. It's, yeah, you're under duress, but you roll out. And again, you're being paid millions of dollars. You're the most experienced quarterback in college football. You got to put the football in bread, escalsons hands. Or Zay Robinson's wide open for a touchdown and get you right back in the

20:48game. And he doesn't even get a chance to dive after it. It's just, it's nowhere. It's in, it's, in no man's land. Why didn't we see Alex Mansky? I'm, I'm confused by that one. Because if it's, if it's going to be this bad, right, if you're going to get blown out by Northwestern, USC and Michigan, I don't even want to talk about those games. That's, that's unacceptable for the veteran quarterback. And I know that he gets, it isn't the need to hear it from me. But Alex Mansky, I think could have gone into that game for a driver to, especially when garbage time had happened. We can talk about the defense, the lack of, again, that's a lack of tackling. That's just a, we don't, we don't want to be here. These are straight up one-on-one tackles with the running back in the hole. And they're just

21:49bouncing off of you. And it's every bit's Cooper E-Bull. It's a lot of players. And again, that goes back to, goes back to coaching. So, what, what can Penn State fix? Where do they go? It's bad. It's really bad. It's not, hey, your one play away. It's a mistake here. The Wisconsin game could have, should have been a lot worse. The Northwestern game was that bad. I just, I didn't think Penn State would be, I thought they'd be a scrappy at, okay, at a minimum, at a minimum, they'd be a scrappy eight and 14. Penn State's not scrappy. This is not a scrappy team. They don't even, they don't even give you their all. And that's what's concerning is the lack of effort, the lack of physicality that it seems like they think they don't belong there. So, that's the concerning part. Because it's not a schematics

22:51thing or an X's a nose. It's, it's down to the fundamentals of you're getting pushed around. You're getting punched in the mouth. And then again, and then again, and you do nothing about it. You don't even try to punch back. A lot of layers to this, a lot of layers to this in the, in the long-term scheme of things again. I don't put it on Matt Campbell. But eventually it does become his problem. One C is, one C's fully settled in and, and everything. So, can they get to 500? Let's re-calibrate the expectations now. Because this, if Northwestern's going to do that, it's going to be a long, it's going to be an even longer season. My name is Axeco. I don't do too many 1a.m. podcasts like this. So thank you for being here. Listening to my honest thoughts when it's late at night. And maybe there's some credence to them,

23:51but really just surprised overall with effort, execution, because I would have not had, I never would have expected this from a team that has a well put together coaching staff. They're still talent on this team. And it's not Ohio State. They didn't lose to a Ohio State like this. It was Northwestern and Wisconsin. It's a bad sign. We'll have more daily content. Penn State football, Penn State recruiting, Penn State wrestling for better or for worse. Daily here. And I appreciate you stopping by, I appreciate you being here. Appreciate all the support. Thank you. I'll talk to you again very soon here on Lockdown Netanylines.

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