Read everything Penn State head coach James Franklin said following 21-7 win over Illinois

Penn State opened up conference play with a 21-7 win over 19th-ranked Illinois on Saturday evening. After allowing an 11-play, 75-yard drive for the Illini to open the game, the Nittany Lions defense not only didn’t allow another score, but they also gave up just 144 yards the rest of the night.

Offensively, Penn State leaned heavily on the run game, totaling 44 rushes for 239 yards against an Illinois defense that ranked 35th nationally in rushing defense, allowing an average of just 104.2 yards rushing per game.

So what did head coach James Franklin think about the performance? Fans can read his complete postgame press conference below.

Opening Statement

Franklin: So, like always, I want to thank you guys for coming out and covering Penn State football. We appreciate it. I really want to start by thanking the fans. That was a phenomenal environment, that wasn’t even a White Out, and we had that. The fans were phenomenal. We thought the fans had seven impactful plays on the game. Seven plays, whether it was timeouts, whether it was false starts and penalties, whether it was bad snaps, we thought they had seven plays that were significant in the game. We’re so thankful and appreciative for the fans and the environment we get here. It’s like nothing else in all of sports, let alone college football. So, we’re appreciative of that.

It was awesome having the 1994 team back here. If you guys haven’t done any homework – I know the vets have – but if you haven’t done any homework on that ‘94 team, the number of guys that went on, I think we had five guys drafted in the first round, guys that went on had significant careers, 17-year careers in the NFL, Super Bowl champions, all that kind of stuff. So, it was great having our brothers back. That was awesome.

A couple other things, when Illinois had the ball on the two-yard line at the end of the second quarter, the fans were significant there. Our defense was significant there. From that point on, we held him out of the end zone. Ended up missing a field goal. From that point on, they only had 59 yards, excuse me, 39 yards. The rest of the game, the rest of the game. So that was huge. Our defense is playing really well. Nick Singleton, Kaytron Allen, you talk about their second set of teammates with 2000 career rushing yards since Franco Harris and Lydell Mitchell. Pretty good group to be associated with. Pretty cool stat there. So overall, I’m really, really happy with our guys. That is a good football team. You’ve got to give Illinois and coach Bielema a ton of respect. That game really played out for a long time the way Illinois wants the game to go. They want one-possession games. They want to keep it tight.

Where I think it went different is, I challenged our O-line against their D-line. And I challenged our D-line, against their front, their O-line, and I think that was the difference, really, in the game. We rushed for 239 yards. They rushed for 34 yards. And it’s not just 34 yards, that is a team that is committed to running the football. They are committed to running the football. And when you’re able to take somebody and force them out of the style of play that they want to play, then usually good things happen. So, we’ve got a ton of things that we’ve got to clean up. You guys, you guys will bring them all up. You’ll bring up all the negative things that we’ve got to get corrected on Sunday. I get it. I get it. I’ll answer every single one of your questions. But I’m proud of our guys, and I’m proud of that locker room. We found a way to get a win at home against a really good, ranked opponent.

Link: Penn State running backs inflict familiar bruising style on Illinois

Q: What about that game made you decide to run the ball as often as you did? And can you expand a little bit on the job the O line did? Everybody looks at the stats of the running backs, but they may not realize what that group did.

Franklin: That’s exactly right. I think the first thing with the O-line and tight ends, they’re playing a physical brand of football, and they’re doing a great job of protecting our quarterback. They’re allowing us to get ahead of the sticks. And the combination of our O-line being physical, and I don’t know if there’s a better combination of running backs in the country. There were physical runs out there today, so I just I couldn’t be more proud of that group and how they’re playing. That’s going to be important for us the rest of the year.

But when you’re able to run the ball like that on offense and stop the run on defense, you know good things are going to happen for you. I don’t want to lose any doubt about that. And for running as often as we did, when you look at Kaytron Allen averaged 5.7 yards per carry, Nick Singleton, 5.9 yards per carry, Beau Pribula, 5.7 yards per carry. You’re stupid to get away from it right? So, Andy [Kotelnicki] was doing a great job calling the game, as you guys know, I’ll mix in every once in a while, just reminding him to stick with the run or time to take a shot. I’m down there, I’m on the sideline.

Sometimes with the play cards It’s good to kind of have these things to reinforce what he’s already doing. But that was the biggest reason. We’ve got to get better in the red zone. We weren’t as good in the Red Zone tonight. Again, got to give them a little credit, too.

Highs & Lows: Penn State bullies Illinois in Big Ten battle

Q: You said in your halftime interview with the radio network that you were very unhappy with the penalties. At this point of the season, should these penalties, some of these penalties, be cleaned up by now, and how do you go about cleaning them up?

Franklin: So, first of all, it’s hard to complain about a bad call when we are getting as many penalties as we are. I felt like at the end of the game, there was a ton of times where we were getting help. For me, I just want to feel like, it’s being called both ways, ultimately all I care about. The one play I had a really hard time with, they called Tony Rojas, who’s running to make a tackle. The ball’s going down the sideline, and he’s going to make the tackle, and somebody comes to block him, and he lowers his shoulder and destroys the guy. What? ‘Cause Tony Rojas is bigger than the guy that was trying to block him? He’s chasing the ball. What’s he supposed to do? He’s going to make a tackle.

Someone’s coming to block him just because he absolutely destroyed him. It’s a penalty? It’s not our fault. And what I was told is that he peeled back to knock somebody out. If the run’s going that way, why would you peel back to make a block? It just doesn’t make sense from a commonsense perspective, and I watched the play. Again, you guys have heard me say before, the ones I struggle with is, right now, we’ve got a reputation for jumping offsides, and they know it, and they’re going to keep doing it until we get it cleaned up. So that’s got us. And the reality is, as good as we played, we made it a lot harder than it needed to be with silly penalties, and that’s all me, like this whole yelling at the kids.

That’s on me and us as coaches. We’ve got to provide more discipline all the time, not just punitive penalties when they jump offsides, being more disciplined about how they are in meetings, how they sit up, how they take notes, all of that. And I believe the more discipline that we have off the field will transfer on the field. And that’s my job.

Instant Analysis: Penn State wins in the trenches against Illini

Q: After Illinois came out and scored on their opening drive, what can you talk about the team effort to then shut them out for the rest of the game?

Franklin: We’ve got to be better on opening drives. The looks you’re expecting to get that you can go down the field to be successful. That’s a week’s worth of preparation to open the game. Same thing on defense, we’ve got to break some tendencies that people aren’t as comfortable going down and make them question their game and what they studied. But when you hold a Big Ten team to seven points, you have a chance to win a ton of games. I’m very proud of our defense and proud of Tom Allen and the defensive staff. When you hold people to 7 points and 34 rushing yards against a Big Ten opponent, you give yourself a chance to win a lot of games.

Q: What is your intention as far as assessing and evaluating that role (kicker)?

Franklin: [Sander Sahaydak’s) been awesome for us and we just won that game, and he should be celebrating this thing like everybody else. But ultimately, we’ll have a competition and all these things will factor in decisions that we’re going to have to make moving forward. But I want Sander to celebrate this win like everybody else, because he’s put a ton into this. He’s a great kid and a great representative of Penn State.

Q: About the defense, obviously Illinois had a really strong first drive when they got the touchdown, but they continued to improve in that second half. Especially with the interception that was returned for a touchdown but ultimately called back. What was the turning point you saw in your defense that allowed you to really shut down that offense?

Franklin: A couple things. I think the first thing is that we did a better job on first down. So, what happens then, you’re able to extend drives. So, we’re much better. Again, back to the 34 yards rushing. They averaged 1.1 yards per carry so that set everything else up. From there, we know that we’re going to get slants and RPO glances because we play a heavy man coverage with outside leverage, so we get a ton of that. And we’ve got to do a great job of getting our hands up to bat those balls down.

We’ve got to make sure we tackle, but they’re going to make their plays because they’re on scholarship as well, but ultimately, we made them one-dimensional. When you’re able to do that, you’ve got a chance to be successful. So, the exciting thing back to Richard’s point and really a lot of your guys’ point, there’s a lot of things that I think are easily correctable and we’ve got to get them fixed. And that’s coming from a defense that held that offense to 219 total yards and 34 rushing.