The annual “White Out” game in Happy Valley has turned into an old-school shutout for star quarterback Drew Allar and the Nittany Lions through three-plus quarters so far.
Penn State‘s defense was the story of the first half as they held the Hawkeyes to just 63 yards on 21 plays and stymied Iowa’s much heralded transfer quarterback Cade McNamara to just five completions on 13 attempts for a paltry 42 yards.
Iowa gained just four total yards on their last four possessions of the first half and trailed Penn State 10-0 at the break.
Meanwhile, the Penn State offense held the ball for almost 22 minutes in the first half and ran off 48 plays, more than twice than Iowa did through two quarters.
But the story of this season so far for the Lions has been ball security and takeaways.
The Nits scored all of their 10 first half points off of two costly Iowa turnovers.
The second one turned into an Allar laser to tight end Khalil Dinkins on a 4th and one at the Hawkeyes nine yard line with just under 10 minutes left in the 2nd quarter.
Allar looked the part of a future NFL quarterback on the touchdown pass:
4th-and-1 TD 🙌
Khalil Dinkins hauls in the laser from Drew Allar for the first TD of the game.@KhalilDink8 x @PennStateFball
📺: CBS pic.twitter.com/wVq2eyuJJ3
— Big Ten Football (@B1Gfootball) September 24, 2023
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Encouragingly for Penn State, Drew Allar has gotten better as the game has gone on.
Allar led his troops on a 15 play 75 yard drive to start the second half that culminated in a two yard pass to his other tight end Tyler Warren.
Allar found Warren again a few minutes later and Penn State is pulling away from their Big Ten counterpart 24-0 through three quarters.
Allar is 23-35 for 163 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions.
The true sophomore, and first-year starter, has thrown seven touchdown passes this year versus no picks.
The Lions have score 44 points off of nine takeaways in the last nine quarters and are the only team in Division I football without a turnover this season. Let that marinate for a while.
Right now, PSU leads the Iowa 24-0 and have held the ball for more than 23 minutes than the Hawkeyes. And get this – Iowa has just two first downs in the game so far.
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It was at PRISM where Staszak produced live games and began his career as an on-air reporter.
After a couple of brief stints with CBS-3, WB-17 and WGAL-8 in Lancaster, PA, Staszak began a 12 year stretch at FOX 29 where he became the lead sportscaster in 2007. It was there that Staszak found himself in the middle of Philadelphia Phillies World Series Championship coverage that earned him an Emmy nomination for best sports reporter in 2008.It was one of five Emmy nominations that Staszak earned over the course of his career.
All told Staszak covered three World Series, two Stanley Cup Finals, an NBA Finals and one Super Bowl during his television run.
Staszak left the TV business for 97.5 The Fanatic in 2013, where he enjoyed eight years bloviating his beliefs on how a professional football team should be run.In 2018 when he fortunate enough to be the first sports talk host in the city, along with cohort Zach Gelb, to provide post-game coverage of the first Super Bowl Championship for the city’s beloved Philadelphia Eagles.
Staszak was also a writer for 97.5 The Fanatic along with 4 Philly Sports and now covers Penn State athletics for NittanyCentral.com.
