Penn State brought the house with about three minutes to play Saturday night at Rutgers, and the result was defensive nirvana.
Gary Nova’s third-down pass landed at the feet of Nittany Lions defensive back Trevor Williams, and the TV cameras caught a bald fellow wildly pumping his fist on the sideline.
How do you do, James Franklin?
After Penn State finally put away Rutgers 13-10 to remain undefeated, the Big Ten Network interviewed Franklin on its postgame set. Then the cameras followed as he high-fived the jubilant Penn State students who made the four-hour trip to Piscataway, N.J.
Franklin adopted the perfect tone in his postgame news conference — proud of the victory, respectful of the opponent, not kidding himself about his team.
“We will wake up and be very honest with ourselves,” he said, “and very critical. We’ll clean up the (mistakes from the) Rutgers game and … who do we play next week?”
“UMass,” a Penn State staffer called out.
“UMass,” Franklin repeated. “That’s who they say we play next week.”
Franklin has been so successful stressing the now that Nittany Lions defensive tackle Austin Johnson said after the game, “We take one week at a time, one day at a time, one play at a time.”
But some of this has to be for show, right?
Franklin is the only coach on the weekly Big Ten teleconference who asks reporters, “How are you?” before they ask questions. He held the door open for one before facing the cameras at Rutgers.
In speaking of his young and often overwhelmed offensive line, he said: “If you guys want to be critical, be critical of me. Please criticize me. They fought for each other.”
OK, so the guy is one part P.T. Barnum. But is that a bad thing?
Penn State is 3-0 for the first time since 2009 with arguably the Big Ten’s best two wins: against Central Florida in Dublin and over a Rutgers team that beat Washington State on the road.
Franklin is also killing it in recruiting, attracting a class ranked No. 7 by 247Sports.com — seven spots better than the Big Ten’s second-best, Ohio State.
And have you seen the grease fire in the spot Franklin left behind? His final Vanderbilt team went 9-4 and closed with five straight victories. The 2014 installment got outscored 78-10 by Temple and Ole Miss before a three-point win over the aforementioned UMass.
A few former Vandy players took shots at Franklin before the season, with one labeling him a “big camera guy.”
Based on the results, every coach needs to be focusing on the little red dot above the lens.
“He definitely brings a lot of energy,” Johnson said. “When we’re down, he picks us up and gets us going again. That’s why we’re winning games.”
Also helpful: Penn State has the conference’s best quarterback in 19-year-old sophomore Christian Hackenberg, who has a cannon for a right arm and the good sense of when to use it.
“He realizes we have a really good defense,” Franklin said. “We don’t have to score every single drive. It’s not the end of the world to punt sometimes.”
That defense, led by tackle Anthony Zettel, dominated the second half at Rutgers, allowing just 95 yards and intercepting Nova three times.
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“They’re very good up front,” Rutgers coach Kyle Flood said. “They have a defensive tackle, [Zettel], who is as good as anybody in the country. We didn’t do a good enough job handling him, and because of that, it was tough sledding for us in the second half.”
While the defense showed toughness, the offense displayed resolve.
On Penn State’s final drive, Hackenberg hit tight end Jesse James for an apparent 19-yard go-ahead touchdown. After the officials called it back, Franklin frantically grabbed his wrist to signal holding, eager to get the attention of his players.
“Didn’t want to get a delay-of-game penalty for being late getting back to the huddle,” he explained.
Hackenberg said he gathered his teammates and simply said, “Next.”
“We had to come back and do our thing,” he said.
They converted on third-and-12 and scored two plays later on a Bill Belton rush into wide-open space.
“Winning minimizes issues,” Franklin said. “Losing magnifies issues. The issues are still there. On offense, it was not pretty. … But our guys are gritty, hard-nosed and never stop believing in themselves and each other.”
As he left the room, Franklin told the horde that covers his team: “Drive safe. Have a good night.”
He got no response until he repeated, for emphasis: “Have a good night, guys.”
Twitter @TeddyGreenstein