Penn State coach James Franklin seeks improvement in many areas

For Penn State football coach James Franklin, there were plenty of areas in need of improvement after his team’s 38-25 loss to Ohio State on Saturday at Beaver Stadium.

“There’s a bunch of things that we got to get cleaned up,” Franklin said via video conference Saturday. “You know, obviously, we got to get in here on Sunday and get a bunch of things corrected. And I know we’ll do that as a staff and players.”

One area that could benefit from an immediate boost is the offensive line. Penn State mustered only 44 yards rushing and allowed quarterback Sean Clifford to be sacked five times.

“For us, offensively, we really struggled in the first half, not being able to run the ball pretty much the entire game, and not being able to protect Sean,” Franklin said. “He was getting hit way too much and had people in his face way too much.”

The defensive line didn’t escape scrutiny from Franklin either.

“Defensively, we really couldn’t get them off schedule,” Franklin said. “They were in manageable down-and-distance situations pretty much entire game. And with a quarterback like (Ohio State’s Justin Fields), and their offensive personnel, not getting them off schedule, it’s going to be challenging.

“I think at the line of scrimmage, I don’t think we consistently won that matchup tonight. Our (offensive) line … same thing with our defensive line. We weren’t able to get them off schedule. We weren’t able to get tackles for loss or sacks. And then the same thing, same thing with our offensive line. There’s a lot of things that go into that, obviously, but we did not win the line of scrimmage (Saturday night).”

On the first play after the opening kickoff, Ohio State running back Garrett Wilson had a 62-yard run. That established a tone for the remainder of the evening for Franklin.

“Yeah, the opening play, obviously, was a big play,” Franklin said. “But that’s going to happen. That happens sometimes, and you got to be mentally tough and you got to bounce back from it. You got to be resilient. But people are going to make plays. … It kind of got us on our heels, and then we were really never able to get them off schedule after that point.”

Franklin suggested the absence of linebacker Jesse Luketa hindered his team. He was not permitted to play in the first half Saturday after being ejected for a targeting penalty during a 36-35 overtime road loss to Indiana on Oct. 24.

“I thought not having Jesse Luketa in the first half made an impact.” Franklin said. “I did feel like getting Jesse back in the second half, you could feel the difference with him in there, not only his production but also his leadership.”

Despite limited playing time, Luketa finished as one of his team’s leading tacklers with four solos and eight assists.

With a meeting at home against Maryland looming this Saturday, Franklin stressed a need for all facets of his team to be on the same page in order to avoid an 0-3 record.

“Every time we would get it going on offense, we’d give up something on defense, and our defense would get a stop and then our offense wouldn’t,” Franklin said. “We just really weren’t playing complementary football.”