After roaring out to a 3-0 start, Penn State football will enjoy the first of its two byes this week. Although there will be no game this Saturday to prepare for, this week is perhaps one of the most critical periods of the Nittany Lions’ entire season. Of course, the Blue and White’s first true test of the year, against No. 6 Oregon, awaits in just 11 days.
However, the bye does allow the program to modify its typical schedule for the upcoming week. Following the Nittany Lions’ 52-6 win over Villanova on Saturday, James Franklin outlined what the next seven days would look like for his players and staff. For starters, his team immediately returned to Beaver Stadium on Sunday, testing out the facility’s new lighting system ahead of next week’s primetime matchup with the Ducks.
“This bye week is obviously going to be really important. This is not an off week by any means,” he said. “Tomorrow, we will practice tomorrow night, which is different for us to get into Beaver Stadium, because we have new lights. We have not been in the stadium with all of the new lighting up. So, we will do that tomorrow night. Then, we’ll practice Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, which is our typical bye week schedule. The guys will have the weekend, including all Friday and Saturday. The coaches will be out recruiting, and then we’ll get into a traditional game week the following Sunday.
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“Obviously, we’ll have the advantage of not having to break down the previous game and not make corrections in practice, so we’ll be a little bit ahead, but we need to get better. We need to get better on Tuesday; we need to get better on Wednesday. And then we need to be able to come in the next week in a really good place with a tremendous opportunity and a tremendous challenge in front of us.”
Despite outscoring its opponents 132-17, the general consensus around Happy Valley is that Penn State has yet to reach its full potential. Next week’s matchup against Oregon will be the first opportunity for the No. 2 Nittany Lions to show that the national title expectations that the program received this offseason were warranted.
“We’re 3-0. I’d love to see us further ahead,” Franklin said. “I’d love to see us playing dominant in all three phases, but we know the things that we need to improve on, and we got plenty of film, and again, this bye week is going to be important for us with a real challenge coming up the following week.”
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