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College GameDay announces familiar Penn State star as today's guest picker

275133747_4796292347117549_592518599057046758_nby:Jonathan Wagner•09/18/21•

Jonathan Wagner

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Brett Carlsen via Getty Images.

ESPN College GameDay has announced its guest picker for week three. The set is in Happy Valley this weekend ahead of the highly anticipated matchup between No. 10 Penn State and No. 22 Auburn. This week’s guest picker will be a very familiar face for Penn State, as former Nittany Lions star running back Saquon Barkley will be back in Happy Valley.

Barkley rushed for at least 1,000 yards in each of his three seasons at Penn State. As a freshman, he accounted for 1,237 total yards with eight touchdowns. In 2016 as a sophomore, Barkley totaled 1,898 yards and 22 total touchdowns, and he had 1,903 yards and 21 scores as a junior. The New York Giants selected Barkley with the second overall pick in the 2018 NFL Draft.

Will Barkley be a star on GameDay as he was at Penn State?

Earlier this week, College GameDay analyst Kirk Herbstreit talked about what makes a great guest picker on the GameDay set. He said that the people who try to over-analyze things aren’t as good on set as those who just come out and try to have fun with it. We’ll see on Saturday if Barkley has what it takes to be a good guest picker ahead of Penn State’s big game.

“I think the entertainers, like the people who get it,” Herbstreit said when asked about what makes a good guest picker on The Players Club Podcast during the week. “We had Ashton Kutcher on last week, and the was just something about, you know, they just have a real like ‘Oh man, I don’t know!’ They’re not trying to break it down. They’re just having fun with it. Ashton Kutcher did a good job of that. The musicians come on, they’re really nervous.

“That’s the thing you forget, we’re just out here having fun. But you walk on that set, you get around all those people, and I think they feel like they need to know what they’re talking about. We don’t want that. We want them to have ‘Oh, man, I sang a song when my first concert was in Kansas, I’m going with Kansas State.’ The guy who gets it of course is Charles Barkley — he’s phenomenal. Bill Murray was at Clemson one time, he was funny. It’s just the guys that kind of roll with it and have fun are the guys who usually do the best.”

Barkley’s return to Happy Valley on Saturday night will also be the return of Penn State’s traditional whiteout. One of college football’s most special atmospheres is finally making a return after a long wait. Even Auburn couldn’t resist joining the whiteout. The Tigers will be wearing a white jersey and facemask combination. It will be the first time Auburn has ever worn a white facemask.