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Pat Narduzzi on Penn State’s late TD: That’s on them, they’ve got to sleep at night
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In the middle of a blowout game in the fourth quarter, there wasn’t going to be much that made Saturday night’s rivalry game between Penn State and Pitt very interesting. And yet, head coach James Franklin found a way.
With Penn State ahead 44-6 with under five minutes to play, Franklin let one of his backup quarterbacks take a snap and fire a pass into the end zone. As if that alone wasn’t bad enough, the play worked, resulting in another touchdown for the Lions.
Sean Clifford hit Brandon Polk for a 34-yard scoring strike to give Penn State a 51-6 lead. Everyone expected that might upset the Pitt players, Pat Narduzzi and the fans.
So what did Narduzzi have to say about Franklin’s scheme? He didn’t use many direct words, but he did take some jabs at Penn State in his post-game press conference.
— Sean Fitz (@SeanFitzOn3) September 9, 2018
“Hey, you know what, I coach Pitt football, I don’t coach for anybody else,” Narduzzi said. “That’s on them. You’ve got to sleep at night. It’s just where we are right now. We’ll have another shot. We’ll have another shot. It ain’t over.”
Penn State held just a 14-6 lead at the half before outscoring Pitt 37-0 in the final two quarters, giving the Nittany Lions two straight wins in the head-to-head clash.
Pitt does get one more shot at its in-state rival before the matchup goes on hold for another decade, as the two teams will meet in Happy Valley.
Something tells me Franklin and his team were sleeping just fine after the decision to run up the score on Pitt in its home stadium.
Dustin grew up in the heart of Big Ten country and has been in sports media since 2010. He has been covering Big Ten football since 2014. You can follow him on Twitter: @SchutteCFB