What Minnesota head coach P.J. Fleck said about Penn State before the teams’ matchup
Penn State is heading on the road for the final time during the 2024 season to take on a team that was partially responsible for the Nittany Lions missing the College Football Playoff in 2019.
The Minnesota Golden Gophers beat the Nittany Lions by a score of 31-26 five years ago, giving them their first loss of two that kept them out of the playoff.
Here’s what Minnesota head coach P.J. Fleck said this week about Penn State, including that 2019 Gopher victory.
On PSU tight end Tyler Warren and Penn State as a whole
“Well, I think when we talk about the consistency is the truest measure of performance — I think that’s what you see every single week. Really, really good player. We got our hands full, put it that way. But it’s the versatility to do so many things. When you’re looking at Penn State, Penn State has the ability to do a lot of different things, and they do it very consistently. But it’s a new wrinkle every single week too. So whether it’s three different quarterbacks, whether it’s unique formations, they’re going to give you things you’ve never seen before, and you’re going to have to stop it, and you have to be really disciplined with your eyes. You have to be really good at tackling in space. You’ve gotta play really good up front. But they have weapons everywhere. But that’s why you’re the fourth ranked team in the country. You’re really, really good, and you got people everywhere that can make plays. And what make them ... really difficult to defend is they just rotate guys in and out. They platoon the D-line, and when they bring in the next D-line, it looks very similar to the D-line that came in before that. They do that with a lot of positions. But it’s the consistency of how they play. It’s the creativity that they play with, but then it’s the ability to give you things you’ve never seen before and make you do in-game adjustments more than probably any other team.”
On Penn State quarterback Drew Allar
“I think it’s just his growth. Over the years, you’ve been able to watch him in different games. The fun thing about when you film study, you cross over so much with everybody who plays each other, and especially in the new league. He’s really, really poised in the pocket. He’s big, strong, got a good arm, understands the system, he can run. That’s the one thing. They’ve got three quarterbacks. One’s a high school quarterback that’s really a tight end who’s just a do-it-all for them. They got another quarterback who can throw it and run it really, really well, and then Drew can do the exact same thing, but they all have different skill sets. And they use them in very different ways. But he’s really accurate, he’s big, he’s strong, he’s physical. I think he processes at a higher level than he ever has. I think that’s a critical characteristic of being an elite quarterback, is how you process, how you get through your reads, how you get to good decisions, how quickly you do that. I think even last night’s NFL game showed a lot of that, you know, from (Los Angeles Chargers quarterback Justin) Herbert, if you were watching some of that game. And we get a chance to watch some of that in the background, and how fast things were happening, meaning he’s open, the ball’s on him. The distance between somebody being open the ball being to him, that’s a measure of quarterback knowing what he’s doing. And I think that he has that trait. You could tell he’s coachable, and the team rallies around him.”
On the defensive line and James Franklin-coached teams
“They’re playing 9-10 guys on their defensive line. I don’t mean this in a bad way, meaning that they’re all the same, but you can’t tell what platoon group is in, because they all are good and they all have special traits. It’s not just about number 11 or number 15 or the guys inside. It’s not about just all of them. It’s about how they can rotate guys in. This is one of the healthiest defenses we played. You look top to bottom, you look in that little injury box that we get at the beginning of the week, and there’s not many of them. But they’re not playing 75 snaps a game. They’re rotating and platooning, and they’re not missing a beat when they’re platooning, these guys in. Very, very aggressive, very good tacklers.
You could talk about how athletic they are and how good of a recruiting job James has done over his tenure, and he is very consistent in what he does. But what I love about watching his groups are they’re really good at the small things. Yes, they have a ton of talent, but can you get that ton of talent to do the little things really well, the blocking, the tackling, the way they tackle, the situational football piece, understanding all that, and they do a really good job of that. That’s a direct reflection of their coaching staff and James and what he’s always got his group to be able to do. But yeah, we’ve got to play really, really good sound football, which we have throughout the year. We just got to put it all together in all three areas for four quarters. That’s going to be critical for us. I don’t think that’s hard for anybody to understand. I know that we’re going to get their best shot. This a top four team fighting for a top four spot in the college football playoff and a Big 10 championship. They’re fighting for that. We’re going to get their best shot. We’ve got to play our best football of the year. That simple.”
On the 2019 win over Penn State and what Fleck can take from it
“Well, it happened. You can take that it happened. I think that when you talk about somebody trusting what you’re doing and how you’re doing it, you need time, consistency, and proof. The win in 2019, they were ranked fourth in the country. But that has nothing to do with the 2024 season. I mean, the things we take from it, a lot of them weren’t even here. Some of them didn’t even know that. Because they were somewhere else four years ago, and so much has happened in their lives. But what you can do is you can pull from really, really, really big games of what playmakers have done. And I think that’s always critical, is we need our best playmakers to play their best. Penn State’s going to need their playmakers to be their best. That’s what happens in November football. And when you can show your own playmakers over the years making plays in huge games, huge moments in November, you want to be able to show them that. And we spent time doing that a little bit yesterday. We took from it, what we needed to take from it, and moved on. And since then, we’ve, shoot that’s five years ago, done a lot in the program since then. But it’s going to be a one game season. It’s going to be 60 minutes we’ve got being our best, period.”
