I don't really care if they cancel squat, as long as the people who neglected to act are no longer tolerated. But the logic that the games must continue so that athletes must not be punished seems weak to me. The whole point of this seems to be that the sports program was given a higher priority than human decency and integrity (the values that PSU has prided themselves on). If some games need to be put on hold in order to clean house, I think those poor players will manage. Somehow.
Penn State AD and Sandusky Charged
- Thread starter Pesky Pole
- Start date
Lifelong PSU fan and haven't posted yet. This tragedy highlights a couple truths.....that no one should be in power that long. Paterno was the last of a dying breed of coaches that spanned a half a dozen presidencies....it won't ever happen again and shouldn't. Fresh leadership is healthy.....Sandusky's deplorable acts could be hidden in the 70s and 80s before the advent of a 24 hr media cycle. And that old school regime buried their heads in the sand and failed to realize that media cycle would get them eventually.
And this shows that college football just has too much damn power.....it was important enough that the program was protected over the victims. Just staggering.
And this shows that college football just has too much damn power.....it was important enough that the program was protected over the victims. Just staggering.
I don't think they should cancel the game to protect/rehabilitate the football team's image (although I'm fascinated by that logic). They should cancel the game because everyone in the community needs to re-evaluate the importance of the game. The notion that the game is too important to too many people in Happy Valley is the entire problem.
The culture that allowed the atrocities to continue was not one of "screw the young people," it was one of "screw whoever it takes, nothing is more important than Penn State football." Think how many people had a chance to intervene: the janitor, the janitor's co-workers, the graduate assistant, the graduate assistant's father, the head coach, the vice president of finance, the athletic director, the school president, and God knows how many others. Are we to believe that it was just a coincidence that those individuals were cowards? Or is the entire community living under a fundamentally compromised paradigm?
In short, they need to cancel the game BECAUSE it's too important to cancel. That's what needs to change.
Universities build a template for how they will handle emergencies, including PR emergencies for lack of a better phrase. After Columbine and 9/11, these plans got far more detailed. Schools with large athletic programs have plans to deal with issues that might arise from one of their teams. Now, I doubt that PSU has a plan for a scandal like exactly like this, but I am sure they have a detailed plan for how to address a scandal surrounding athletics. These plans usually include stages of action that are designed to minimize media speculation and to show that the university is being proactive in handling the situation quickly, legally, etc.
PSU fired the President quickly, but they have allowed the media to run wild with this, beginning with their decision to not fire/suspend Paterno immediately. In my opinion, the riot is on PSU. Just as they immediately suspended the AD and VP, they should have also suspended Paterno. It buys them time, allows them to control the information, and then use that time to put out a consistent message. I guarantee they have a plan for the need to cancel a game. The longer they wait, the worse this gets. It allows the media and all of us to argue about what they should do about the game(s) and it makes them look like they are weighing the profit of a football game against the fallout from the scandal.
In the end, they lose no matter what they choose and there is a good chance that the students riot again regardless of the decision about the game. So yes, I think the BOT handled this poorly.
PSU fired the President quickly, but they have allowed the media to run wild with this, beginning with their decision to not fire/suspend Paterno immediately. In my opinion, the riot is on PSU. Just as they immediately suspended the AD and VP, they should have also suspended Paterno. It buys them time, allows them to control the information, and then use that time to put out a consistent message. I guarantee they have a plan for the need to cancel a game. The longer they wait, the worse this gets. It allows the media and all of us to argue about what they should do about the game(s) and it makes them look like they are weighing the profit of a football game against the fallout from the scandal.
In the end, they lose no matter what they choose and there is a good chance that the students riot again regardless of the decision about the game. So yes, I think the BOT handled this poorly.
There was, in reality, no chain of authority for Paterno to report up to. Joe Pa was it, and no one told him what to do in regard to anything involving the football program (the AD was a former player of his). With god-like powers comes responsibility.
The other distinction between Duke and PSU is that, in the Duke case, the guilt of the lacrosse players was the fundamental issue, but people failed to let that fact get in the way of their moral outrage. In this case, whether Sandusky is guilty is fairly distinct from the fact that Paterno, et al. knew about it and covered it up for twenty years. Sandusky's guilt (which seems pretty clear based on the grand jury documents) is, in a way, irrelevant to the complete moral bankruptcy that existed at the highest levels of PSU.
Have you by any chance read the grand jury report? It's not like this case is based on one unhinged person's allegation, as the Duke case was. There's no rushing to judgment on the facts of the case here. There's also no questioning whether Paterno could have done more to dig into what was happening in the football team's showers and failed to do so. He's conceded as much. If you think he shouldn't have lost his job for that and have a argument based on the interpretation of the facts, I can understand that, but to say that people are rushing to judge the facts is simply incorrect.
Gutsy to say that stuff...even gutsier to do so with a Dorsett jersey on.
Ha ha. You're so funny Tom. And rape jokes - just the best.
But I've calmed down a bit. Just trying to be rational here. Trying to address all the folks who think I am a puffed-up, overwrought fake. I get it. Shit like this happens all the time. Catholic Church and all.
But sit down calmly and think about this for a moment. A major, state-sponsored university with half a million alumni and the power of a national football brand essentially sponsored serial child rape in the name of protecting its football program. As I said earlier, the football program was and is the problem. The blind devotion to football and the Paterno personality cult created an environment that made child rape OK. In hindsight, everyone condemns it, but that's meaningless; everyone always condemns bad stuff once it's happened and there are no consequences. But the people attached to the football program specifically suppressed information that would have prevented the rape of children, because they wanted to protect the football program. If we condemn the individuals without reference to the institution, we ignore the root cause of the indivduals' actions: protecting the institution no matter the cost. If we punish the institution, if we make the institution accountable, we make progress in trying to prevent indivduals in the future from making similar decisions, as they should understand that the institution cannot be protected from these kinds of things. Punishment hurts. It's not always fair. But it should have an educational and/or deterrent effect. That's why I think they should cancel the rest of the games. The collateral damage of lost revenues and "but these kids had nothing to do with it" outrage should pale in comparison to the effect of the punishment and the value of the lives of the victims.
And as much of a Texas homer as I am, as loyal an alum as I am, if this was happening in Austin, then yes, I would be on a plane yesterday and standing in front of the Main Building or Bellmont demanding accountability and the cessation of the football program. I can live without football if it didn't exist. I don't know if I can live without my soul and my conscience.
I'll be down there with you, giving my support as a Ok State Cowboy fan.
This was well said.
I think they should forfeit Saturday's home game. It's likely to turn into a 3 hour eulogy to Paterno and Penn St. football. Fans will be holding signs, joining in chants, and waiving cardboard cutouts of JoePa. And that's wrong. I don't care about the economic consequences of it. I don't care about the seniors getting to play another home game. I don't care if the campus spontaneously erupts into flames. Those are the consequences of numerous employees allowing child rape to occur for years.
For instance.
Notwithstanding the many little things that they did wrong, the investigation has been going on since 2009 and the incident dates back to 2005. If the Board of Trustees didn't know about the investigation, they are inept, and if they did know about it, they clearly didn't have a plan to deal with the outcome that actually happened.
There was an outpouring of support for a young boy, and his family, in Dallas this summer after a tragedy at a baseball game.
Will there be a similar outpouring of support in Pennsylvania, college football, and throughout the nation for the tragic victims in this situation? Given the new-found prominence, is there an out-pouring of support for the then-boys victimized in the Red Sox clubhouse?
I fear there is more passion behind whether a game should be played or not than there is about how these victims can be helped. (I certainly don’t know how to help.)
I will do one small thing that I know I can do. I will raise this uncomfortable topic with parents and (where appropriate) kids in all the youth programs in which I am involved. Teaching a third-grader when to tag-up pales in comparison.
I don’t care if Penn State plays Saturday or not.
Will there be a similar outpouring of support in Pennsylvania, college football, and throughout the nation for the tragic victims in this situation? Given the new-found prominence, is there an out-pouring of support for the then-boys victimized in the Red Sox clubhouse?
I fear there is more passion behind whether a game should be played or not than there is about how these victims can be helped. (I certainly don’t know how to help.)
I will do one small thing that I know I can do. I will raise this uncomfortable topic with parents and (where appropriate) kids in all the youth programs in which I am involved. Teaching a third-grader when to tag-up pales in comparison.
I don’t care if Penn State plays Saturday or not.
You're citing a three-day old article to judge the Trustees' reaction to a six-day old crisis.
The current scandal revolves around the 2002 rape that McQueary witnessed and reported to Paterno. The whole crux of the scandal was that Paterno and a few members of the PSU administration conspired to keep that incident private. You are holding the Trustees accountable for not knowing about that conspiracy. If the cover-up was so ineffective that people who do not live or work in State College knew the truth, we would have no scandal.
The Trustees didn't know, and should not have known, anything more than what Madden reported about the grand jury investigation. Madden's report didn't give the Trustees any reason to believe Spanier was unable to manage the situation, let alone part of a cover-up.
Former PSU players are contributing to Sandusky's legal defense fees:
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7220097/penn-state-nittany-lions-rally-program
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7220097/penn-state-nittany-lions-rally-program
A more complete summary of that article is that one (idiotic) 73 year old player from the 1959 team is trying to get former players to pay Sandusky's legal fees, and that it's possible a couple of players may have pitched in. Let's not lump all "former PSU players" into one group.
That's an interesting interpretation of what I wrote. The headlines for the WSJ this morning include Stocks Leap As Europe Worries Ease and Gingrich Grows on GOP Voters. Would you interpret that to mean that all stocks are up today and Gingrich has grown on every GOP voter.
It's interesting that any PSU player(s) are shuttling funds to Sandusky, especially publicly. I don't profit from ESPN's hits, so I wasn't trying to make the headline more salacious.
Could not agree more with Awesome Fossum and Bongorific.
Frankly, all of the stuff that Bongorific alluded to would seem just so inappropriate at this time. Cheering and joy from 90,000 on Saturday is just too uncomfortable of a juxtaposition for my tastes. I won't be watching.
I'm a lawyer, so I'm going to ask you nit-picky questions, then hopefully answer your question better. By knew - I assume you mean knew to a certainty, not suspected or heard rumors. And what do you mean by covered for him? Provided alibis, lied to officials, or just kept quiet?
So they should cancel the game because it provides a forum for free speech? I don't much care for Paterno-apologists, but they have a right to express their opinion, and they're gonna do it regardless of whether there's a game on Saturday or not.
First, you asked why there is a consensus PSU mishandled the situation. That articles sets forth some of the reasons (and things didn't get a whole ton better in the last three days). To me, just those facts indicate a crisis management blunder. Obviously we disagree.
I'm not sure what you are saying about the rest. I am not holding the Trustees accountable for the conspiracy. From a crisis management perspective, either (i) they didn't know about the AG's investigation, which is possible but I would believe doubtful, in which case they should have axed everyone immediately for failing to report the investigation, or (ii) they knew about the investigation and didn't bother to put together a crisis response if things went south.
At any rate, maybe we'll just have to agree to disagree.
I have 2 fundamental problems with playing the game, at least as if it were normal, nationally broacast game.
The first is that it will most likely be a celebration of Paterno, which is just further embarassment for PSU.
Second, is that as others have mentioned, this crisis is a result of the power of the PSU football institution, just as the Catholic Priest abuses were a function of that institution, and the Sox abuse a result of the Yawkey institution. As much as I want there to be help for the victims, the biggest impact going forward isn't about those victims, it's about (or should be about) trying to prevent it from happening.
According to the espn.com sportsnation poll (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/fp/flashPollResultsState?sportIndex=frontpage&pollId=126716) 40% of the country still thinks this is all unfair to Paterno. Even if that's off by 10%, there are a lot of people not making the connection; either because they don't know the facts, or because they just misunderstand the relationship between power and abuse. Cancelling the game may be overboard simply because it won't turn those people, and maybe it just makes attitudes towards this disaster more polarized. But in my mind, it's unacceptable that more people don't see the connection, simply because that is how these serial pedophiles keep finding refuge for their crimes.
The argument against getting it over with as soon as possible is that everyone's emotions here are still raw. That can lead to some pretty bad shit. The Catholic Church comparison can only go so far. The Church is far more diffuse and diverse than the crowd that would go to a Penn State game.
This is more or less exactly why I think the case for the cancelling the game is so dubious. It should be cancelled because people hold unacceptable opinions?
There's no denying how shameful their behavior is/was but I get the frustration on the part of the students, having been at Indiana for the Sampson situation.
One of the reasons I went to IU was because of the storied basketball team and an expectation that during my time there, we would be a team competing for a national title for four years.
Instead, after the Eric Gordon year, I saw 1 total Big Ten wins - or win.
I never thought about transferring or anything but it definitely was frustrating and unfair to the students who live and die Indiana basketball.
This situation is different obviously but I still think that for the same reason it's unfair to the football players to cancel the season, it's unfair to the students as well.
They had nothing to do with the absurd situation that took place and shouldn't be punished for it like I was.
Assuming it's the Trustees' call to make, their only consideration should be the good of the University. If playing tomorrow is best for PSU, they should play. (I'm not concerned as others about security.) If not playing tomorrow is best for PSU, they should forfeit the game. I don't see an overarching moral issue -- PSU isn't pro-pedophile if they play, and they're not anti-free speech if they don't.
This is absurd. It's one thing to be empathetic to the players, or the innocent coaches/admins (if that's the case), or the hot dog vendors, but the students?
Having said that, this school is so fucked and if my kid was in line to go their next fall, you couldn't pay me to write a check that will be used, in part, to pay off these assholes legal proceedings.
Not that I wholly disagree with your post (I'm for cleaning house, but not on the "death penalty" bandwagon), but the fact that people believe punishment for egregious violations of rules/morals are "unfair" to students who choose to attend a college based on their athletic reputation is kind of ludicrous and one of the reasons why we have this whole "look, a football coach is more revered than any other member of an institution of higher learning" problem in the first place.
EDIT: typo.
See, that's where I disagree - and now it's not a philisophical debate, it is a pragmatic one. I just don't think cancelling the three remaining games will have the punitive impact on the bad guys you expect, nor the positive effect on the victims.
I think it is incredibly difficult to create a deterrent to child sexual abuse. There's a reason we call those who do it "sick fucks", they're not mentally right. They know the consequences already - and choose to act as they do. Sometimes I wonder if we're a little off target using a criminal hammer on a mental health nail. Criminal punishment is about paying one's debt to society, and getting a fresh start - and I just don't think that applies to pedophiles. Criminal concepts such as due process and rehabilitation just slow things down. These people just can't be free. Ever. I guess this is discussion for another time, though.
What we CAN deter is the covering-up of child sexual abuse, and to maybe send a message that yes, it happens, a LOT more than you think - and that thing you saw last week, really WAS what it looked like, and you SHOULD say something. Maybe if Joe Paterno understood that his friend was mentally fucked up, and needed to go somewhere far away from children for the protection of the children he'd abused, and for the protection of himself, this would have played out differently.
I'll admit, there may well be some pretty good rationale for cancelling THIS weeks game, in Happy Valley. There is the fact that the lost revenue punishes the machine that perpetrated these acts and cover-ups, there are legitimate public safety concerns, and it's going to be a media circus. Penn State made this mess, and having them pay a price for it isn't unreasonable.
It's the games in Columbus and Madison that matter to me. Ohio State didn't make this mess (ironic that they have their own mess, but THIS one isn't on them), and Wisconsin seems to have run a relatively clean program. The other consideration is; Just how big a pair of checks would Penn State have to write to Wisconsin and Ohio State as compensation? I don't pretend to know the numbers here, but the loss of one home football game revenue, plus the compensation to two other schools for loss of their home football game revenue might push past the range of "punitive" to Penn State, and closer towards "crippling". The figure would be expressed in fractions of billions of dollars - and I think the aim of any action here is to punish Penn State, not put Penn State out of business.
I reckon that if me and you were the committee for deciding what to do, we'd compromise and cancel this weekend, while keeping the other two games alive. I could live with that.
This all does point out WHY college football is out of hand. There's so much money at stake, that people can't always act as they should. That's not an excuse for covering up rape, but it shows cause for a lot of other acts.
I will note that it bothers me that some in here have so little regard for the people who work their asses off on the non-sport side of event production. That they're dismissed as "hot-dog salesmen" and "bar weiners". They're people, from day labor to skilled professionals, without whom YOU wouldn't have any games to watch - and yes, they matter. I really don't care so much about the actual players, and how hard they worked...they'll be fine, they're working towards something else, and pro scouts will find them if they're good enough. I'm not comparing these people and their importance with the victims of child sexual abuse, I'm just trying to get a little more respect for the work they do.
Where are you getting this idea? That would be an incredibly small fraction. OSU nets about $4.5 million per home game, of which it has to give about $1.5 million to the Big Ten for revenue sharing. The Big Ten would almost certainly waive any lost revenue, so you're talking about PSU paying OSU and Wiscy each a couple of million dollars, and losing a few million from its own home game. It can easily afford to cancel the games.
Again, Gricar did not bust the heroin ring and was not directly involved in either the investigation or prosecution. The investigation was carried out by a state-wide drug task force and tried by the Attorney General's office, not the District Attorney. His only ties to the case are having been apprised of the ongoing investigation and a representative presence at a press conference as a Centre County law enforcement official. And what indicates the drug rings are from the same criminal organization or linked in any way? There's a whole lot of heroin dealers from NYC/NJ.
Gricar did not leave suddenly and unexpectedly. He called his girlfriend before he left and was later seen parked outside of an antique store he frequented often. Just because two cases are in someway similar does not mean they are related. Two guys show up to a hospital with a fever, sore throat and muscle aches - similar symtpoms. Do you give them the same diagnosis? They could simply both have the flu, or one could have an acute HIV infection. Similarity does not necessitate relativity.
Another thing that hasn't been mentioned is how the FBI was of the belief that Luna's death was a suicide staged to look like a murder. At the time of his death, Luna was scheduled to take a polygraph test regarding $36,000 that went missing from a bank robbery case he had prosecuted at had $25,000 in delinquent credit card debt.
My point is that the whole massive drug cartel theory carries about as much weight as saying Gricar diappeared because of the Sandusky investigation. I'd even lean towards giving greater credibility to the latter based on recent reports of Gricar having been actively involved in the Second Mile charity.
[quote name='Hendu's Gait' timestamp='1321040823' post='3846277']
This is absurd. It's one thing to be empathetic to the players, or the innocent coaches/admins (if that's the case), or the hot dog vendors, but the students?
[/quote]
Why is it absurd to be empathetic for students?
You guys don't understand Big 10 athletics. If you grew up in and around Penn State, like a huge number of the kids at Penn State did, you grew up loving this team. You watched them on TV every Saturday, maybe even went to the game a few times a year. Maybe you went tailgating with your family. You finally became a Freshman at Penn State and you get to party with your friends and wake up at 8AM to drink and cheer on your favorite team and some asshole ten years ago gets exposed for some horrific crime, your favorite coach gets fired, and now a huge part of your life is ruined. That sucks.
This is like if you won Red Sox season tickets for 2012 and MLB announced that it was canceling baseball because of the some reason. It would suck for you. You might understand why they were doing it, but it would still suck. It's worse even. It's like if ALL sports were canceled ALL YEAR. That's what it's like to live in most Big 10 communities - there are no other sports except college football.
Personally, I think the game/season needs to be canceled. But I say so knowing that it is incredibly unfair to the students who had no part in this. This is a price that needs to be paid so that the program can be cleaned, not a punishment that needs to be handed out to the student body. Kids do not need to learn to "reprioritize" and focus on school or whatever. This is college. It's supposed to be fun. Big 10 athletics are fun. There's no reason to punish people who had no part in this if it can be avoided.
This is absurd. It's one thing to be empathetic to the players, or the innocent coaches/admins (if that's the case), or the hot dog vendors, but the students?
[/quote]
Why is it absurd to be empathetic for students?
You guys don't understand Big 10 athletics. If you grew up in and around Penn State, like a huge number of the kids at Penn State did, you grew up loving this team. You watched them on TV every Saturday, maybe even went to the game a few times a year. Maybe you went tailgating with your family. You finally became a Freshman at Penn State and you get to party with your friends and wake up at 8AM to drink and cheer on your favorite team and some asshole ten years ago gets exposed for some horrific crime, your favorite coach gets fired, and now a huge part of your life is ruined. That sucks.
This is like if you won Red Sox season tickets for 2012 and MLB announced that it was canceling baseball because of the some reason. It would suck for you. You might understand why they were doing it, but it would still suck. It's worse even. It's like if ALL sports were canceled ALL YEAR. That's what it's like to live in most Big 10 communities - there are no other sports except college football.
Personally, I think the game/season needs to be canceled. But I say so knowing that it is incredibly unfair to the students who had no part in this. This is a price that needs to be paid so that the program can be cleaned, not a punishment that needs to be handed out to the student body. Kids do not need to learn to "reprioritize" and focus on school or whatever. This is college. It's supposed to be fun. Big 10 athletics are fun. There's no reason to punish people who had no part in this if it can be avoided.
OK, the "fractions of billions" was hyperbole...but I wouldn't be so sure the Big 10 would certainly waive their revenue. If Penn State can't fulfill its obligations to show up for their away games, that's a BIG deal in the world of sports leagues. Everyone wants to play their home games, it's showing up for the away games that is one's real contribution.
The point is, PSU is one of the 3 or 4 most profitable football programs in the country. It has already generated over 80% of the cash it was going to this season. If it cancelled all three games, and were forced to give OSU and Wiscy full freight as well as the Big Ten (and whether the B10 waives or not, the revenue sharing is based on gate receipts, so I don't even know that the conference would be entitled), this season would still be extremely profitable, safely within the top half of the Big Ten in net revenue, and well near the top nationally. The idea that the program would be financially crippled by cancelling these games is preposterous.
Just read a summary of the events linked to by Deadspin, which includes a piece of information that I hadn't seen elsewhere, and which, to my knowledge hasn't been discussed yet here.
[font="Verdana] [/font][/color][quote][font="Arial"]According to Paterno's testimony, McQueary told the coach he had witnessed Sandusky "fondling or doing something of a sexual nature" to the boy.
[url="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/who_knew_what_about_jerry_sand.html"]http://www.pennlive....jerry_sand.html[/url]
In particular, I'd yet to read anything suggesting that Paterno told the grand jury that he stopped the conversation between himself and McQueary before it became too graphic. If that's true, it sounds very damning to me, and it actually seems very clear that Paterno was the link in this chain in which the story became so watered down that his superiors didn't feel the need to act on it. [font="Verdana] [/font]
edit: fixed.
[font="Verdana] [/font][/color][quote][font="Arial"]According to Paterno's testimony, McQueary told the coach he had witnessed Sandusky "fondling or doing something of a sexual nature" to the boy.
Two days after the report was released, Paterno issued a statement saying he wanted to correct the impression left by the presentment.
Even though Paterno himself had told the grand jury that McQueary saw "something of a sexual nature," Paterno said this week that he had stopped the conversation before it got too graphic. Instead, he told McQueary he would need to speak with his superior, Athletic Director Tim Curley, and with Schultz.
[/font][/quote][font="Verdana] [/font][/color][url="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2011/11/who_knew_what_about_jerry_sand.html"]http://www.pennlive....jerry_sand.html[/url]
In particular, I'd yet to read anything suggesting that Paterno told the grand jury that he stopped the conversation between himself and McQueary before it became too graphic. If that's true, it sounds very damning to me, and it actually seems very clear that Paterno was the link in this chain in which the story became so watered down that his superiors didn't feel the need to act on it. [font="Verdana] [/font]
edit: fixed.
I don't mean to read anything into your post, but are you implying the higher ups at PSU didn't act because of a pernicious version of the telephone game wherein one of the participants was too squeamish to faithfully repeat the message he had been given?
You are reverse engineering facts to fit the narrative you want here.
I say this because the AD and VP later talked to McQueary and he was explicit with them about what he saw. I mean, they are under indictment for perjury because McQueary told them exactly what he saw.
The point here is that Paterno may not be a profile in courage, he isn't the link where the story became watered down. The story was watered down when the AD and VP of Finance/Business - who knew all of the details - told a different story to the President of the University, who then directed them to bury it weeks after the fact.
There is not a single piece of solid evidence that Gricar's disappearance is related to Sandusky or Penn State. Not a single piece. There isn't even any circumstantial evidence.
I know it's not a popular stance to take in this thread, but the absence of evidence is not evidence.
I didn't mean to imply that it was squeamishness. Just that, it seems to me that with all the Joe Paterno supporters claiming that he did his job, it certainly doesn't sound like he did his job there.
I went to a Big 10 school (one of the bigger ones, too) as did my brother and my stepdad. This is a gross overstatement (and by extension, an excuse you're using to deflect criticism of PSU) of the attitude. Yes, football Saturdays are fun and popular. In Michigan, they supermarkets print "Let's Go Blue!" on the receipts, so I know it's important part of school identity. But I also know that at my school the protests against Paterno and the administration would 10x larger than the ones crying in their Solo beer cups about because there's no game.
Don't know if I missed this upthread or in one of the others, but Penn State has gotten its first decommit, and it's the program's top recruit.