Oregon at Penn State marked by great unknowns

A football season is an unfolding story. In the summer Clemson was a trendy pick for the national championship, based on a senior quarterback and lots of returning talent. The Tigers are 1-3 and in the ACC, Miami and Florida State have taken their place.

Every year some plots fizzle and others gather energy. Suddenly the Big Ten looks harder and way more daunting than it did in Fall Camp. USC and Washington have emerged with potent offenses. Indiana looks like a juggernaut. Even at Rutgers, quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis has thrown for 288 yards a game.

Thanks in part to the portal there is more balance and competition in the top half of the conference, and there are fewer easy outs on the schedule. The road to an 11-1 or 10-2 regular season is not as clear.

The portal has become a weapon in building a roster and the best teams have a blend of high school talent and experienced veterans from the Transfer Portal. In fact, the top ten teams in portal recruiting are a combined 27-0 after four weeks of the season.

With Oregon traveling to Penn State Saturday, 4:30 p.m. PT on NBC, the pregame narratives center around the power of the White Out as a home field advantage, Penn State's experienced offensive line and devastating running attack against an untested Oregon defense, the Nittany's Lions pressure and the hostile environment maybe being too much for a redshirt sophomore quarterback in his first high-profile game on a national stage.

Outside the Duck bubble many people are saying the Penn State coordinators, Andy Kotelnicki and Jim Knowles, will outduel Will Stein and Tosh Lupoi, much in the way Ohio State did at the Rose Bowl.

In his fourth season Dan Lanning is 39-6, 29-0 against unranked teams, 10-6 against ranked teams, 2-4 against the Top Five. He's succeeded in building a roster that dominates lesser talent, and his skills as a motivator and teacher have led to wins in storied Big Ten environments like the Big House and Camp Randall.

He even beat Ohio State in a regular season game, stealing a possession with a surprise play in special teams, stealing time off the clock with a manipulation of the rules at the end of the game. He's relentless and hyper-focused.

But what fans can't know ahead of this first big game of the 2025 season is how this year's version of the team will respond to the challenge of facing a team with similar or greater talent. That part of the story is not written. Pundits can conjecture based on analytics, statistics, recruiting rankings and grades, but the actual game comes down to execution in the moment, handling one of the most high-pressure and iconic environments in sports.

Yes, Kenjon Sadiq and Dakorien Moore are other-worldly talented, Yes, Dante Moore throws a beautiful ball, and he's looked poised and composed at home and in normal circumstances. But this is a crucible, and there are problems to solve on offense and defense, an opponent with weapons and talent of their own, including one of the best running games in college football, one that gashed Oregon for 297 yards in the Big Ten Championship Game.

Questions remain, questions that won't be answered until the two teams tee it up and play. Pundits can pretend to know and try to sound authoritative, but the players will write that story.

Will the superb Penn State offensive line, spearheaded by center NIck Dawkins and guard Vega Ione, push around an Oregon defensive front that gave up some chunk runs to Northwestern? The Ducks need a great game from tackles Bear Alexander, A'Mauri Washington, Terrance Green and Tionne Gray.

At linebacker the Ducks have the tandem of Bryce Boettcher and Jerry Mixon, a three-star walk-on and a three-star from Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep in San Francisco in his third year in the program. The two have played exceedingly well in Oregon's 4-0 start-- Mixon is the national leader among LBs in PFF grade-- but in this game they have to fill gaps and flow to the ball against a opponent with NFL talent in the offensive line and at running back.

When Dan Lanning and Tosh Lupoi won national titles at Georgia and Alabama, they did so with defenses loaded with blue-chip players and first-round NFL draft picks. This Duck defense has a few, but the cornerbacks are both freshmen and the linebackers are overachievers without elite body types.

Fans and pundits can't know how they will perform in this kind of pressure, what edges and vulnerabilities will prove to be decisive. We pretend to, but we can't.

The biggest unknown at all is at quarterback. On one side there is Drew Allar, 6-5 senior, projected first-round draft pick, but he has only occasionally made big plays to win a big game. He's been inconsistent. On the other is Dante Moore, completing 75% of his passes, looking poised and resourceful, but so far his three FBS opponents are a combined 0-11.

How Allar and Moore will respond to this much pressure hasn't been determined yet, but Allar has more experience with it. He's been on the winning side in two playoff games, and he's playing at home. The crowd will quiet for him. Dante Moore has to tune it out.

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