Penn State OC Mike Yurcich, confident in plan, cites improvement path

Penn State offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich was offered a blunt proposition.

Weeks after concluding a deeply disappointing 2021 season, the Nittany Lions’ offensive production was a subject of scrutiny. Not enough yards, not enough proficiency, and not enough points helped transform a promising unbeaten campaign into one that finished 2-5 down the stretch.

Facing all Big Ten opponents during that span, with a 4-5 mark for the year, could Yurcich’s approach work in this conference?

“I think there’s no question that it could work in the Big Ten,” Yurcich said. “It can work in any conference that we play.”

For a multitude of reasons, this season, it didn’t.

Finishing 81st in total offense at 380.8 yards per game, offset by 274.4 pass yards (22nd), the Nittany Lions struggled converting on third downs (38.5 percent, 77th) and had the nation’s 82nd-ranked red zone offense (82.1 percent). Crucially, Penn State also posted just 26.2 points per game.

Offset by 44, 38, and 28-point performances in the nonconference, Penn State’s production was worse in the Big Ten.

Excluding a defensive touchdown scored at Maryland, Penn State finished the season unable to top 28 points scored offensively in any of its conference games. And excluding the eight points scored in overtime in the 20-18 loss to Illinois, the Nittany Lions’ offense put up just 21.1 points per game in the Big Ten. 

The dismal showings of Indiana (10.4 ppg), Northwestern (13.0), Rutgers (13. 7), and Illinois (19.3), prevented Penn State from finishing lower.

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When evaluating the critical missing ingredients to the group’s success, Yurcich pointed to the number of manageable yardage opportunities, be it in the red zone, on third down, fourth down, or otherwise, that were missed. 

“I think one thing that stands out for us is short-yardage execution. That’s one of the things that we’re currently looking at in bowl prep and trying to evaluate why the lack of execution there,” Yurcich said. “You look at the reasons and sometimes it’s execution. It’s a mistake here. It’s a mistake there… We look at, was it the call? Was it the personnel issue? Was it a mental mistake, a physical mistake? And we chart all of those things. What you find out is, it’s a little bit of everything. That’s what happens.”

This season, it happened too often for the Nittany Lions to produce any type of consistent offensive success.

Reaching the red zone just 39 times and cashing in with touchdowns on only 20 of those trips, the Penn State struggled to produce points.

Stressing the importance of physicality, a mindset he’d touted as both necessary and present for Penn State ahead of the 2021 season, Yurcich laid out the case for future improvement.

“We got to find our identity. We have to continue to play to our personnel strengths and we have to continue to break tendencies. And at the end of the day, we got to continue to be more physical, tough-minded. And just focus on the basics of football, the basic rules,” Yurcich said. “We can sit here and get fancy all day. And at the end of the day, we’ve got to have something to put our hat on. You got to have that identity and we tried to establish that identity. 

“We wanted to come downhill at you and we wanted to get under center at times. And we wanted to be physical. We’re gonna continue and stay steady in the boat with our plan. And we’re going to be able to adjust along the way on things that we feel that we need to adjust based on our personnel.”