The Lion in Autumn (11 page)

The Student Book Store, the leading independent merchandiser of Penn State and Paterno paraphernalia, already was packed. Inside, life-size Paterno cutouts ($39.95) were being sold to fans dressed for a game that was still seven hours away. The coach's familiar face—its long Roman nose, dark eyes squinting intently behind tinted glasses, pursed lips, all topped by that dark thicket of hair—could be seen on three-foot-tall JoePa bobble-heads ($349), on JoePa Christmas ornaments ($6.95), on JoePa masks ($6.95), and JoePa afghans ($59.95). Norm Brown, the shop's manager, said business had been down the last few seasons, but that today, with a new season's optimism so tangible, it was picking up again.

In the lengthy breakfast line outside the nearby Corner Room restaurant, some fans had on T-shirts that expressed their devotion to Paterno. Others wore “True Blue” buttons.

“True Blue” was, in part, a reaction to all the anti-Paterno talk of recent years. Founded during the off-season by a pair of Penn State students, Jon Apperson and Justin Casavant, its principle aim was to eliminate the negativity and apathy that were becoming so apparent
at home games. That trend had begun with the odd sound of Beaver Stadium boos during the stunning 2000 loss to Toledo. The college community was as dismayed by the booing as by the loss. When more boos and more defeats followed, posters bearing the inscription
WE BELIEVE
, printed on a blue background, began appearing in doorways and windows all around town, hopeful stars in a darkening sky.

“I figured it was OK to get upset, to second-guess Joe, but . . . we needed to do something to show our support,” said Rob Schmidt, the general manager of State College's WBUS-FM, the radio station that distributed the signs. “The signs are our way of saying that we believe everything will be all right.”

The new negativity was distressing for many in Happy Valley. The University Faculty Senate, at the urging of Scott Kretchman, the school's NCAA faculty athletic representative, responded with an antibooing resolution. It encouraged Beaver Stadium fans to “reduce or eliminate” boos and tasteless cheers like “Bullshit!” or “Ohio State sucks!”, to refrain from cheering when opposing players were hurt, and to applaud good play on both sides. When the ridiculously naive guidelines were read over the loudspeaker system at a game later that 2000 season, they were, not surprisingly, met by even louder boos.

(Curiously, Penn State's decline had helped with fan decorum elsewhere. At University of Pittsburgh home games, students had once delighted in chanting “Penn State Sucks! P-E-N-N-S-T Sucks!” even when their team wasn't playing its longtime rival. Now the derisive cheer had virtually disappeared. “We said it because they [Penn State] were good,” Pitt student Tim Murphy told the
Daily Collegian
. “But now they do suck, so we don't do it anymore.”)

Still, it was true that during the Nittany Lions' mediocre new millennium, the level of excitement at Beaver Stadium had been greatly reduced—despite crowds that rarely fell below a hundred thousand. The notable exception had been the near delirium that accompanied the Saturday Night Massacre of Nebraska on September 14, 2002—a 40–7 Penn State triumph that briefly revived the glory.

“[We] were just kind of talking about the atmosphere, and how we might have the quietest hundred thousand fans in the nation,” said True Blue's Apperson of his motivation. “If you had an atmosphere as
close to [the Nebraska game] as possible for every game, it's certainly gonna be a weapon.”

True Blue wanted all fans, but in particular the twenty thousand or so students who attended each game, to adhere to three principles: “1. Wear Blue. 2. Be early and rowdy. 3. Stay to the end.”

Now, in the hours before the Akron game, as spectators gathered along a stadium-entrance walkway to greet the Lions on their arrival, a True Blue member in white hard hat and a blue No. 11 Penn State jersey led them in raucous cheers.

“Let's Go, baby! Remember, We are . . . PENN STATE.”

At just about that time, after having parked his car in the driveway of his mother's Cape Cod house on nearby Park Road, athletic director Tim Curley was making the short walk to the stadium.

He had grown up in this house, across the street from the old Beaver Field. He played football at Penn State in the 1970s, then began working as an administrative assistant to Paterno. By 1993, he had risen to AD. Now at fifty, he was a member of Paterno's Palace Guard, those Penn State employees and trustees who owed their loyalty—not to mention their jobs—to the coach. One local sportswriter that summer expressed the widespread view about Curley and President Spanier when he wrote that they were “seemingly puppets sitting on Paterno's knee—and there's no question who pulls the strings.”

Curley's morning walk spoke volumes about the professional but unpretentious atmosphere Paterno had created. Though it was a sweltering September 4, the AD wore a tie and an oxford shirt. He exuded a buttoned-down contentment. And why not? He was working in his hometown. For his alma mater. He could park at his mom's house. And why should he ride to the game in a limo or park in a reserved spot when he could walk?

That was all so State College. So Penn State. So Paterno.

Over his left arm, Curley carried what had become the most essential element of the Paterno-era Penn State uniform—a blue blazer. Like so many other traditions at the school, the fondness for blue blazers could be traced back to the coach. He was absolutely fanatical
about players and athletic-department staff dressing professionally. His obsession, friends said, dated back to his early days as a Brown student.

Ever since he had worn a sweater to a fraternity party and been humiliated, he rarely was caught underdressed. A blue blazer had been a staple of his tastefully conservative wardrobe. And though his recent game attire often included a blue windbreaker in its place, Paterno seldom went more than a day or two without donning one.

The “Penn State Blazer” had become so embedded in the college's culture that it frequently was awarded as a prize at university golf tournaments or fund-raising events. You could buy them in several College Avenue clothing stores. Jack Harper's Young Men's Shop offered a limited edition of a thousand “Penn State Navy Blazers” at $295 each. Distant alumni could custom-fit their own by purchasing a set of nine brass buttons, engraved with Penn State's official seal. The buttons sold for $129.98 in the university's bookstore.

So it wasn't at all surprising that when a police escort deposited the buses carrying the football team at its stadium entrance ninety minutes before the Akron game, Paterno emerged with a blue blazer slung over his left arm.

His face betraying nothing, the coach, eyes down, walked by himself down the tunnel and into the locker room. The senior captains, quarterback Zack Mills and linebacker Derek Wake, came next, followed by the rest of the team.

It was 2:05
P
.
M
. The buses had arrived fifteen minutes behind schedule because Paterno and the coaches had kept the team longer at the Lasch Building. The revamped coaching staff wanted to make sure players understood what was at stake. The 2003 disaster was over, Paterno told them. It was time they all ran into that stadium and carried Penn State back to its rightful place in the football universe.

“He reiterated a lot of positive aspects,” linebacker Paul Posluszny would say of his coach's pregame talk. “He said we had put in all that work and that now was the time to reap those benefits. He reassured us that we could play this game. He said we are Penn State and only great football players come out of here.”

Paterno and the players eventually drifted onto the field for warm-ups. The coach found his Akron counterpart, J. D. Brookhart, at
the 32-yard line. Brookhart, in his first year at the Ohio school, had been Pitt's offensive coordinator for the past seven seasons and the two men had met often in the past.

As his team lined up to stretch and loosen up, Paterno walked among the rows of young men, patting their padded shoulders, or pulling them closer to him for a private word of pregame encouragement.

Paterno then shook referee John Carson's hand and thrust an arm around the official's shoulder in a gesture of reconciliation. Paterno had made national headlines two years earlier when, after a 42–35 loss to Iowa, he chased Big Ten referee Dick Honig into a Beaver Stadium tunnel, grabbed him by the shirt, and complained about two controversial calls. The old coach had criticized the officiating frequently the last few seasons, and increasingly carped at officials from the sideline. In doing so, he had earned himself the belated reputation of a referee baiter.

At the opposite end of the field, Akron players were also going through warm-up routines, occasionally glancing up at the huge crowd that was building around them. Soon, both teams retreated to their locker rooms for final instructions.

Penn State players were buoyed by a season-opening optimism. They were ready to win this game and begin to make up for the indignities of last year. Just before 3:30, Paterno called them together for a few final instructions and the Lord's Prayer. This was the best part of the week for him.

“To gather a team around you just before a big game,” Paterno once wrote, “to look at grown men huddling close to each other with tears in their eyes, each one taking the hand of another on each side until everybody and every soul in that room is connected, each pledging to give and to expect the best, each becoming part of all the others—to look into those strong faces that say,
If we can only do it today
—to be there is to see and touch and be touched by people who have joined a cause that they have made bigger then themselves. If they can do it here, they will be able to do it anywhere.”

Then he led them to the mouth of the tunnel that opened onto the southern end of the stadium. He stood motionless as the emotionally charged players hopped in place behind him, slapping each other
on their shoulder pads, their collective shouts joining into an eerie, anticipatory chant.

Just as they appeared to be approaching a frenzy, Paterno raised his right arm and began to jog toward the field. The signal released the blue-shirted swarm behind him and soon the coach was overtaken by charging Nittany Lions. The delighted fans, having waited more than nine months for this sight, arose with a thick, throaty roar.

Paterno felt exactly as he had at the start of his fifty-four other Penn State seasons. Excited. Upbeat. A little nervous. There was just one difference. He had never wanted to win any more than he did right now. Not so much to quiet the critics, but for his own peace of mind. For Penn State. And especially for the kids.

The few seniors who joined him on the field today hadn't enjoyed the same Happy Valley experience as their predecessors. There'd been too much losing. Too much turmoil. Paterno felt guilty about that.

Now, he and his players believed, things were about to change.

“We now have the confidence that we can win big-time football games,” Posluszny would say. “We're going to be a team that contends for the Big Ten title.”

Paterno knew this was going to be a competitive year in the Big Ten.

Michigan, Ohio State, Purdue, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa. The Nittany Lions would play all but Michigan this year and any of them could be the team to beat. But like his squad, all of them were flawed—though certainly to a lesser degree. There wasn't a super team. In fact, the Big Ten was probably only the fourth best conference in the nation this year—after the SEC, Big Twelve, and Pac Ten. So who was to say Penn State couldn't make some noise?

Akron was from the tough little Mid-American Conference. MAC schools, eager for the media exposure and the approximately $425,000 a trip to State College earned them, had recently become annual early-season fodder for Penn State. The pressure for victories in State College was eliminating big-time interconference matchups. Since the addition of the Nittany Lions in 1993, each Big Ten team played eight of the ten others. In the remaining three or four games,
Paterno didn't need severe nonconference tests at home. So former opening-game opponents like Texas, Southern Cal, and Georgia Tech had been replaced by Toledo, Central Florida, Temple, and Akron. The Beaver Stadium crowds would be enormous regardless of the opponent, so why take a chance on losing? This would be Penn State's twenty-first game against a MAC team. The Lions had won nineteen.

In 1999, before the current struggles dawned, Penn State had beaten Akron, 70–24, in its opener. But the following season, another MAC team, Toledo, upset the Nittany Lions, 24–6, in their Beaver Stadium debut. While this Akron team appeared to be physically overmatched, no one anymore could safely predict a Penn State victory.

Akron had gone 7–5 the previous season. They were small and shallow on both lines, but they did return senior quarterback Charlie Frye. Frye had thrown for 3,549 yards and 22 touchdowns last season, practically double the combined 2003 totals of Mills and Robinson. And since Brookhart had installed the West Coast offense, Frye figured to put the ball in the air even more this year.

At 3:37
P
.
M
., Robbie Gould kicked off. Akron couldn't move the ball and quickly punted to Penn State, who had sent Robinson back in yet another role, punt returner. The Nittany Lions' offense answered a lot of lingering questions merely by taking the field. Even though Tony Hunt had trouble with some preseason conditioning tests and had had difficulties in the classroom, he had beaten out Austin Scott for the starting tailback's spot. Mills was the quarterback, and Robinson was lined up as a flanker.