sean clifford

Can you believe it? An actual formidable opponent! I know Maryland straddled the line a few weeks back but Penn State is seemingly another level. 5-0 on the season, ranked #10 in the country, a test for the Michigan Wolverines that will tell us a lot about both squads involved. 

The Film: Penn State's schedule so far this season has not been the most difficult, which made choosing a game for this exercise tricky. Ohio and CMU are crossed off for being MAC teams and the Northwestern game is eliminated for the opponent being very bad and also having taken place during a monsoon. That left me with Auburn in week three and Purdue in week one. Neither of these teams are terribly close to Michigan in caliber, and Purdue is a step above Auburn. That led me to choose the Boilers, even though I don't love doing a game that took place a while ago (thankfully PSU has had good injury luck to make this translatable). Additionally, I felt Purdue's defense is a bit more similar to Michigan's given their strong run defense, compared to Auburn, who rank in the bottom third of the FBS in that metric and who got gashed on the ground by the Nittany Lions. 

Personnel: Click the chart for big or here for PDF. 

Sean Clifford will start at QB for Penn State for the fourth straight year against the Michigan Wolverines and is largely the same player he was last season. In the event that he gets injured, true freshman Drew Allar would be next up on the depth chart and he has played in several games this season so far. 

At RB, Penn State has made five star true freshman Nicholas Singleton the starter, averaging an impressive 7.3 yards per carry this season with 5 TDs. Fellow Tr Fr Kaytron Allen is #2 in the RB rotation, while returning veteran Keyvone Lee, who beat out Noah Cain for the job last year, has been demoted to #3. Devyn Ford, who flashed during the COVID year and played some early in the season, is no longer with the program. 

The WRs return two starters, Parker Washington and KeAndre Lambert-Smith. Those two were second fiddle to Jahan Dotson last season but Washington was already becoming a star himself and has solidified that status this season. Lambert-Smith was the #3 option in 2021 and that has not changed. He was injured early in PSU's game against Northwestern before the bye and it is unclear if he will be ready to go this weekend. Dotson's shoes have been filled by WKU transfer Mitchell Tinsley, who was an All-CUSA player in the Hilltoppers' pass-happy offense last season. Tinsley has become the #2 option in the WR room behind Washington. In Lambert-Smith's absence, Harrison Wallace III has gotten on the field but if everyone is healthy, the three main guys will be on the field nearly every snap. 

Penn State entered the season looking for someone to step up at TE and right now Brenton Strange has done that. He was PSU's favorite TE early last season before fading as the year went along. So far, so good in 2022 for Strange, the third leading receiver with 15 catches for 231 yards and a team-high 4 TDs. Part of Strange's success has been injury to his main competitor, Theo Johnson. Johnson has the more impressive recruiting profile but was banged up to start the season, making his season debut in week three and still didn't look fully up to speed. With the bye week behind him, I expect Johnson to be closer to full strength this weekend. Blocking TE Tyler Warren has gotten more snaps than usual with Johnson in and out of the lineup, but he does not have the dynamic receiving ability that Strange and Johnson can flash from time to time. 

The OL has been PSU's Achilles heel on offense for years now. They return just two starters from last year, RT Caedan Wallace and Juice Scruggs, who has slid from G to C. Wallace is still the turnstile he was last year, while Scruggs has done pretty decently moving to a new position. All new starters Landon Tengwall and Sal Wormley at guard have held up alright thus far, but a quality of competition adjustment is likely needed. The same can be said for new LT Olumuyiwa Fashanu, who appears to be better than the black hole that was Rasheed Walker, but Michigan will be a different beast than what PSU has seen so far. The backup OT is Bryce Effner, sometimes coming on as a 6th OL in beef packages, but he is a trouble spot. Hunter Nourzad, Cornell transfer, is the backup IOL. He got a little bit of play in the game I watched as well but I don't have many notes on him. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: Different year, same thing]

It's football content season again, everybody! With less than four weeks to kick-off, it's time for the return of The Enemy, Ranked (as well as Football Bits later this week). Just like last year, we will be counting down Michigan's 12 opponents ranked by each positional group, but this year we will be counting down from worst to first. Today we'll be starting with the quarterback position. 

12. Connecticut

Get used to this. I have a feeling most of the articles will be beginning with UCONN in the cellar because *glances at UCONN football's history dating back to the 2011 Fiesta Bowl*. At QB it's no different. Amazingly, the Huskies' likeliest starter is someone B1G fans may be familiar with, Ta'Quan Roberson. He was the backup at PSU last year who was called into game action against Iowa when Sean Clifford went down with injury... it did not end well. Roberson went 7/21 for 34 yards, which, yes, comes out to 1.6 yards per attempt(!!!!!), with 0 TD to 2 INT. It was some of the worst QB play I have ever seen in the B1G, which is not a high bar to clear. Roberson is a former top 300 recruit, so there is some raw talent, but there's a reason he got on the field once in his first three years in State College, and even more reason that he was forced to go to UCONN out of the transfer portal. He's bad. 

If it's not Roberson, it could be Tyler Phommachanh (fun name), a RS FR who got into three games last season to the tune of  48.6% completion at 4.5 Y/A, 1 TD to 2 INT. He was a 2021 recruit who was outside the top 2,000 in the composite(!!), whose other offers included Army, Albany, and Central Connecticut State. As you can guess from the Army offer, he has some running upside, but has not shown much passing. Cale Millen could also be the guy, a similar profile to Roberson as a former Top 300 guy who lost his way, never getting on the field at Oregon, taking a stop-over at Northern Arizona, and now finding the path to Storrs. He attempted 15 passes at Northern Arizona, under 50% completion and under 3 yards per attempt. Yeah. 

[Associated Press]

11. Hawaii

The Rainbow Warriors have a cluttered QB room, which is the result of a coaching change after Todd Graham was fired and Timmy Chang was inserted in his place. The one guy who stuck around to see the change through is the nominal leader on the depth chart, Brayden Schager. He was a Who Dat 2021 3* recruit with mostly FCS offers that chose Hawaii despite Todd Graham being the coach and managed to get on the field as a true freshman. Schager did about as well as you'd expect a true freshman thrown into the fire by a dictatorial head coach who the whole team hated to do, 2 TD to 5 INT on 60.2% completion. There were some happy moments, including an upset of Fresno State (Schager's 11-for-27 performance suggests it was in spite of him) and a game where he ripped apart decrepit New Mexico State, but as a whole, he was well below par. There's an optimistic case that with another year of experience and perhaps better coaching, Schager can be better. But will he be significantly better by week two? Doubtful. 

If it's not Schager as the signal-caller, it might be Joey Yellen, a former Top 300 recruit who is now on his third program in four seasons, with five career appearances to his name. His performance as a true freshman in 2019 for ASU showed some glimmers that were then washed out in 2020 and he did not get on the field for Pittsburgh a year ago. Cammon Cooper also transfers in with a similar recruiting profile in his past, although he has just 23 career attempts in regular season action. It's hard to know who the starter will be and if any of these guys will be good. Right now, there's no reason to suggest they will be, and certainly not for week two, which is why they're 11th. 

10. Colorado State

One thing to know about the Rams is that they basically copy-and-paste'd the entire Nevada program to Fort Collins by hiring Jay Norvell in the offseason. Some pieces were lost in translation, but a huge chunk of the Wolfpack program packed up its bags and followed their coach two states over. One such member of the program was Clay Millen. First off, I will acknowledge that just three teams into this piece we have a "Cale Millen" and a "Clay Millen". You are correct, they are brothers. Unlike Cale, Clay is expected to start for his new school, as he exited spring practice with a firm grip on the starting job. We don't know a ton about Clay Millen; he was a 3.5* star recruit in the 2021 class for Norvell and then threw two passes as a freshman while maintaining his redshirt. That's it. Assuming he gets the start on September 3 in the Big House, that will be his first career NCAA start. Could be great! Could be terrible!

I ranked Colorado State at 10, ahead of 11, because I think there is a decent chance Millen will be better than Schager when they see Michigan. Both are 2021 recruits and though Schager has more experience, Millen is the one who has had the same head coach for both seasons, even if he transferred. Therefore, I expect him to be a bit ahead of Schager developmentally, with the same coach and system in front of him both years. Moreover, given Norvell's track record of QB development in producing Carson Strong, I'll slot CSU ahead of Hawaii if both have relative unknowns at QB, which they do.

[AFTER THE JUMP: some bad B1G QBs]

11/13/2021 – Michigan 21, Penn State 17 – 9-1, 6-1 Big Ten

Sean Clifford sat down on the sideline and let his demeanor crack briefly. Unfortunately for him, this moment was caught by ABC's cameras and broadcast nationwide. He collapsed on the bench and looked like he'd spent several hours in a car wash, without a car. Weary. Bone-deep weary. His jersey looked like he was wearing one of those HOUSE DIVIDED half-and-half monstrosities, this one split equally between Penn State and Grass & Splintered Bone Tech.

GASBTU has a regionally competitive meat judging team [Barron]

He was in the midst of getting sacked seven times and running for his life another couple dozen times. He'd flung passes to receivers who merrily dropped them. He was big parts of the third-and-medium ground game. He'd watched his coach call for a fake field goal on the two yard line. At some point, he knew, he would have to go out there again and pretend for exactly 2.1 seconds that the useless pylons the OL coach insisted were the starting tackles would block the two demons Michigan insisted were college students instead of stygian nightmares conjured up in a foul act of summoning prowess. (Michigan's position: "why not both?")

Sean Clifford sighed a sigh. He sat and calcified on the bench. He sighed again. Eventually got up.

--------------------------------

Opposing fans are not known for empathy. Anything short of psychotic narcissism generally qualifies you as one of the good ones. But as Penn State lurched into a fourth quarter lead, Michigan Twitter thoughts evolved from "how is he doing this" to "I hope he stops doing this" to "I'm glad he stopped doing that" before finally landing on a sort of elegy.

When your opposition fights like a lion and then has the courtesy to die, you parade him around, lauding his heroism. Appreciating his martial spirit, which was perfectly calibrated: just enough to lose valiantly. Well done. Now we get to feel the exhilaration of a close win. You get to wonder if Clifford's sanity meter is going to overflow against Rutgers.

Michigan fans saw the same thing happen to one of the most physically promising quarterbacks to ever land in Ann Arbor. Devin Gardner looked like a Heisman contender while batting away 300-pound defensive tackles under the lights against Notre Dame; several games later he had the same jersey Clifford does above, except worse.

[Bryan Fuller]

He was no longer the same quarterback. Nobody is when the expectation moves from the possibility of improvisation to the necessity of flight. Clifford isn't, either. Penn State was on their way to a win over Iowa when he got crushed by an unblocked blitzer. When Clifford came back his running ability was put on the shelf, and Penn State went into a tailspin.

Even in this game when PSU turned his legs back on and he started off brilliantly he faded down the stretch, overthrowing open receivers and finally jacking up a hopeless, inaccurate fade as RJ Moten tore at him just like the Iowa defender had a month ago. It's not clear whether Clifford had time to realize that his mesh routes had been obliterated. Watching it again, it feels like Clifford saw Moten charging at him and had an octopus nope moment. Not because he's not tough enough—the preceding 57 minutes are evidence enough—but because he is a human and you can only endure so much blunt force trauma in a short period of time before you are a human who very much does not want to continue having a football attached to his person.

These are the works of Ojabo and Hutchinson. Look on them, ye quarterbacks, and despair.

AWARDS

Known Friends and Trusted Agents Of The Week

"not in the face" [Bryan Fuller]

you're the man now, dog

#1 Aidan Hutchinson/David Ojabo. We're just flipping the Hutchinson/Ojabo pairing and Haskins until further notice. Five sacks between Michigan's twin towers of destruction to go with three fumbles forced and a critical holding call drawn by Hutchinson. Hutchinson was so terrifying that at one point a PSU running back looked straight at Junior Colson charging upfield unmolested, decided that he should block Hutchinson instead, and may have been correct to do so since Hutchinson just went through both guys to share a sack with Colson. Meanwhile Ojabo leads the country in forced fumbles. Full points for both, because you try explaining to them why they don't get full points.

#2 Hassan Haskins. Michigan's bell cow again with Corum out. Rough start, smooth finish with 31 carries for 156 yards and another 45 yards on 5 receptions. Making Michigan's garbage short yardage package work through sheer will. Ripping through linebackers on the regular. Just a miserable bastard to tackle all around.

#3 DJ Turner. Yeah PSU got him on the TD and the two point conversion but those were throws that were uncontestable, particularly the two point conversion. Turner had in fact done a terrific job to give PSU nothing but a tough ball down and to the outside; Dotson and Clifford executed it. Outside of that Turner got in two PBUs, one on the first snap and one on Dotson in the fourth quarter, while providing at least solid and usually very good coverage the rest of the day.

Honorable mention: Cade McNamara had some hiccups but put up 7.5 YPA against a very good defense. Roman Wilson scored a couple of TDs, one on a skinny post he won decisively on. Colson and Josh Ross put in yeoman work with little support for most of the day and turned in important TFLs. Brad Robbins out-dueled Jordan Stout in the punt-off.

KFaTAotW Standings.

(points: #1: 8, #2: 5, #3: 3, HMs one each. Ties result in somewhat arbitrary assignments.)

42: Aidan Hutchinson (HM WMU, #2 Wash, #1 Rutgers, #1 Wisc, HM Neb, #2 NW, T3 MSU, T2 IU, T1 PSU)
30: Hassan Haskins (HM WMU, T3 Wash, T2 NIU, #2 Neb, T1 NW, #1 IU, #2 PSU)
21: David Ojabo (#2 Wisc, T3 MSU, T2 IU, T1 PSU)
18: The OL (#1 Wash, #1 NIU, HM Neb, HM NW)
17: Blake Corum (#2 WMU, T3 Wash, T2 NIU, HM Neb, T1 NW)
10: Cade McNamara (#1 MSU, HM IU, HM PSU)
8: Ronnie Bell (#1 WMU), Brad Hawkins (#1 Neb),Dax Hill (#3 WMU, HM NIU, HM Rutgers, HM Wisc, HM Neb, HM MSU)
7: Brad Robbins (HM Wash, #3 Rutgers, HM Wisc, HM PSU), Josh Ross (HM Wash, HM NIU, HM Rutgers, HM Neb, HM NW, HM PSU)
6: Nikhai Hill-Green(HM NIU, #2 Rutgers), Jake Moody (HM Wash, HM Wisc, #3 Neb, HM MSU), DJ Turner (#3 NW, #3 PSU)
5: Cornelius Johnson(HM NIU, HM Wisc, #3 IU), Andrel Anthony (#2 MSU)
4: AJ Henning (HM WMU, #3 NIU), Roman Wilson (#3 Wisc, HM PSU)
3: Donovan Edwards(T2 NIU)
2: Erick All (HM NW, HM MSU), Junior Colson (HM IU, HM PSU)
1: Andrew Vastardis (HM WMU),Mike Sainristil (HM WMU), Mazi Smith (HM Wash), Gemon Green(HM NIU), Chris Hinton (HM Rutgers),  Taylor Upshaw (HM IU)

Who's Got It Better Than Us(?) Of The Week

Michigan runs the Mother Of All Mesh Routes against cover one to pop Erick All open for the game-winning touchdown:

TD WOLVERINES !

Quelle réponse de Michigan ! Un drive parfait conclu par ce TD sur réception de TE Erick All.

Penn State 17, Michigan 21pic.twitter.com/JFQ1QQp1KL

— TBP College Football (@thebluepennant) November 13, 2021

FYI, this was the biggest swing play of the week in college football, spiking Michigan's win percentage by 24%.

Honorable mention: Macdonald calls the Mother Of All Mesh Beaters on PSU ensuing drive; McNamara drops a dime to Wilson; the other dime to Wilson; any of various Robbins mechapunts; any of various Hutch/Ojabo pass rushes.

​MARCUS HALL EPIC DOUBLE BIRD OF THE WEEK.

McNamara is violently blindsided on third and eleven for a sack strip that eventually sends PSU ahead for the first time.

Honorable mention: Fourth and six fake punt conversion after timeout; third and seventeen conversion earlier on that drive; four different false starts put Michigan behind the eight-ball on offense.

[After THE JUMP: well it's M-PSU so we have to talk about someone deciding something absurd]