Penn State Football

Penn State football releases depth chart for Week 1 game at Temple

By Jourdan Rodrigue - jrodrigue@centredaily.com

With the release Tuesday morning of the Penn State football team’s depth chart for Saturday’s game against Temple at Lincoln Financial Field, it’s officially official: Football is back. Welcome to week one.

The depth chart features one offensive senior starter and five defensive senior starters alsongside 15 players in the top slot who are either sophomores or redshirt freshmen.

Defensively, five of the front seven starters are either eligible juniors or seniors, and in the secondary, senior Jordan Lucas at strong safety and senior Trevor Williams at cornerback have 73 combined games of experience.

Related: Head coach James Franklin answers depth chart questions as Penn State prepares for Temple

The depth chart breaks down as follows:

Quarterbacks

Junior Christian Hackenberg, of course, was named as the starting quarterback for the Nittany Lions.

Hackenberg’s third straight season as the signal-caller for the Nittany Lions puts him ahead of redshirt freshman Trace McSorley and true freshman Tommy Stevens.

Running backs

Akeel Lynch is back at top back for the second consecutive season. He is followed by redshirt freshman Mark Allen, then redshirt freshman Nick Scott and, finally, true freshman Saquon Barkley.

Head coach James Franklin announced that Barkley had gotten the “green light” to play this season, and many thought he might nab the position directly behind Lynch.

Receivers

Sophomore Chris Godwin is listed at the top receiver in the “X” spot, followed by sophomore Saeed Blacknall and true freshman Juwan Johnson, while redshirt sophomore DaeSean Hamilton is in the top “Z” position above redshirt junior Geno Lewis and redshirt senior Matt Zanellato. Speedy redshirt freshman DeAndre Thompkins is the top-listed receiver in the “F” spot above true freshman Brandon Polk.

Offensive linemen

This particular group has had an interesting story arc since the end of last season, with an open slot at left tackle and redshirt freshman Chance Sorrell and junior college transfer Paris Palmer fighting to fill it.

Palmer won the starting nod, at least for game one, and the rest of the starting spots were fairly predictable. Redshirt sophomore Brendan Mahon earned the top line at left guard, graduate senior Angelo Mangiro will start at center, redshirt junior Brian Gaia grabbed the starting spot at right guard and redshirt sophomore Andrew Nelson is the starting right tackle against Temple.

Tight End

In an interesting twist, Adam Breneman, who was expected to play his first official season with Penn State after missing all of the 2014 season due to a knee injury, was not listed on the depth chart.

Instead, sophomore Mike Gesicki beat out redshirt junior Brent Wilkerson, who, in turn, topped graduate senior Kyle Carter on the depth chart’s tight end listing.

Defensive line

There weren’t many surprises on the experienced line.

Senior Carl Nassib and redshirt sophomore Garrett Sickels (the youngest defensive line starter) have the top listings at defensive end, while senior Anthony Zettel and redshirt junior Austin Johnson, will, of course, return to start at defensive tackle.

Linebacker

At strong side linebacker, junior Brandon Bell earned the start for Saturday’s game, over junior captain Von Walker, who will contribute heavily on special teams. Redshirt junior Nyeem Wartman-White will be making calls at middle linebacker, a shift from his 2014 spot on the weak side, which will in turn be filled by sophomore Jason Cabinda.

Cornerback

Sophomore Grant Haley and senior Trevor Williams will be manning the top corner spots against Temple, but true freshman John Reid earned the second listing behind Haley.

Reid is one of six true freshmen listed on the depth chart.

Safety

Senior Jordan Lucas will enter his first year at starting strong safety, while sophomore Marcus Allen, who was thrown into the safety position in Penn State’s last seven games of 2014, will return to start at free safety.

Special teams

Joey “Big Toe” Julius earned, as predicted, the starting kicker spot after several promising appearances in the spring and fall, while backup punter Chris Gulla will hold.

Sophomore Daniel Pasquariello is the starting punter for Penn State on Saturday, and on the Nittany Lions’ attack, redshirt freshman safety Koa Farmer is listed as top kickoff returner followed by Barkley. Redshirt freshman running back Mark Allen is billed as top punt returner, followed closely by Thompkins and Polk.

Notable

Temple also released its depth chart for Saturday’s game, and it’s very experience-heavy.

Nineteen of 22 listed Temple starters are upperclassmen.

This story was originally published September 1, 2015 at 11:58 AM with the headline "Penn State football releases depth chart for Week 1 game at Temple."

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