Drew Allar Finds New Weapons in Impressive 2025 Debut | Penn State QB Report Card
All eyes were on the Penn State Football passing attack Saturday afternoon, as senior quarterback Drew Allar began the 2025 season breaking in a new receiver corps for the Nittany Lions.
While Allar‘s statline for Penn State’s first game of the season was not eye-popping, Allar was efficient and effective distributing the ball and was able to lead the Nittany Lions offense to 39 points before exiting the game at the beginning of the fourth quarter. Here’s how Allar’s day went down.
Penn State QB Report Card from 46-11 Win Over Nevada
The Good
Allar was very effective at finding Penn State’s new wide receivers in game one.
A season removed from Penn State not seeing a single receiver catch more than five passes in a game, both transfer wide receivers Kyron Hudson and Trebor Pena passed that mark Saturday.
Allar found Hudson six times for 89 yards, including a beautiful 31-yard touchdown at the end of the first half. Allar was also able to hit Pena with seven passes for 74 yards on the day.
The Bad
While playing an overmatched Nevada team, Allar still took too many hits, especially in the run game, this early in the season.
Penn State’s offensive line looked like it still needed time to settle in and fix a few things before conference play begins and Allar was forced to move out of the pocket or scramble more than he should have against Nevada’s defense.
Allar ended the day rushing for 20 yards on six carries, but took quite a few hard hits on those plays.
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The Ugly
While Penn State did not need to send the punter out onto the field at all Saturday, the Penn State offense still showed issues that need to be corrected before Oregon comes to town in a month. Penn State’s offense stalled out four times in plus territory forcing the Nittany Lions to kick four field goals against Nevada.
All four field goals were within 40 yards as well, with two being 28 yard chip shots. On the bright side for the Nittany Lions, Ryan Barker hit all four field goals to put 12 points on the board for Penn State.
Still, this is an area that needs major focus over the next two weeks before Oregon comes to town.
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Ethan Grunkemeyer
Ethan Grunkemeyer was able to see his first extended action as a Nittany Lion against Nevada Saturday, impressing in his regular-season debut.
Grunkemeyer came into the game for the Nittany Lions at the beginning of the fourth quarter and immediately led Penn State to a 94-yard touchdown drive.
Grunkemeyer completed seven of his nine pass attempts on the day for 86 yards and added a touchdown on the ground for the Nittany Lions (his first in blue and white).
Grunkemeyer gave Penn State fans something to be excited about as he showed off his arm, connecting with Andrew Rappleyea for a 26-yard pass (which was called back on a Liam Clifford block in the back penalty) and Khalil Dinkins for a 24-yard pass.
Overall Grade: B
Allar played well enough for Penn State to leave Beaver Stadium with an easy win that was never in doubt.
The effectiveness Allar showed hitting the top two wide receivers was encouraging if Penn State can sort out some of the issues along the offensive line.
With another two relatively easy opponents coming up in the next two weeks on Penn State’s schedule, Allar and company will have plenty of time to fine tune the offense before conference play begins at the end of September.
We can expect Grunkemeyer (or Jaxson Smolik) to get more work over the next two weeks as Penn State should once again be getting backups into games to build depth.
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