Penn State at West Virginia: Preview & Prediction | Can new PSU offense roll Game 1? | Cover 3

back here on the cover three podcast live on CBS Sports Network getting you set for a big week one in the Big 10 and one of the biggest matchups of the entire week is Penn State's visit to West Virginia now this was a a Penn State win when these two faced off last year and it was in a season where Penn State kind of dominated a lot of the teams they played not named Ohio State and Michigan one of the closer of those other non- Ohio State and Michigan matchups so let's start to get into it let's take it big game breakdown style Danny what aspect of this matchup stands out to you as something that you're interested in or that you think will be key in deciding the winner what's this Penn State offense look like right they bring in Andy Colton Nikki from Kansas to revamp it to bring some more Firepower some big play potential for Drew Aller who was very good with the football last year statistically the touchdown interception ratio it pops out to you it's like wow that was a really strong year but when you Dove deeper in there were a couple stat padding games where you're thinking okay I need to see a little bit more out of him now he did have a good game against West Virginia last year but also not only Colton Nikki's offense but what does Julian flemon bring the transfer from Ohio State is he that big play Big play potential receiver outside that can get those big chunk yards and those 40 50 yard plus touchdown you know throws and plays through the air so that's what I am most excited to look like Drew Aller is a big physical you know specimen at the quarterback position can they unleash him can he take it to another level that's what I'm very curious to see in a hostile Road environment there in Morgantown Tom you were a long fan of what Andy coton Nikki in the Kansas offense was and the ways that you know they they utilized lots of different aspects to create matchup advantages um number one you know do you think this translates does per does Penn State have the kind of personnel and and how do you think that some of that same success that The Jayhawks offense had could end up showing up in this matchup against West Virginia and I hope they have the Personnel because if Andy cotal Nikki was able to do with the Run game and offenses that he was able to do at Kansas and with the players he had at Buffalo considering how Ben stada has recruited in recent years they better be good enough to take of this but I do think that we are going to see Penn State take a step forward offensively this year and the one thing that I really think is going to matter in this matchup in particular is how effective that run game looks I know going into last season we were wondering if Drew Aller could be the guy to finally take that offense to the next level and give Penn State that kind of top tier quarterback he didn't really live up to it although he did post some good numbers but I think in this matchup it is going to be all about running the ball because last season Penn State ranked 8 six nationally in explosive run rate compare that to Kansas where Andy cotal Nikki was last year with lesser Talent where they were 2 first nationally so will he be able to bring that to this offense to create more big plays create more explosive plays and just generally make life a lot easier on Drew Aller and a receiving core that I don't think has a true kind of alpha player because on the other side if you look at West Virginia last season they ranked 105th nationally in EPA allowed per Rush this was a defense that had trouble stopping the run that is something I think that we might see some improvement in going into a new season but I don't know how drastic of an improvement we'll be able to see so I think Penn State needs to step forward and keep their foot on the gas on the ground uh bud when you think about some of the you know NFL Talent that's been coming out of Penn State even as as recently as just last year they also end up losing Manny Diaz he goes to take the head coaching position at Duke but I I get a sneaking suspicion they still might be kind of salty on the defensive side how do you see Penn State on the other side of the ball in terms of this matchup and then maybe even the season as a whole yeah so CH it'll be interesting with the new defensive coordinate they brought over from Indiana right they're a lot bigger on the defensive front Manny Diaz was going to prefer kind of a lighter more penetrating player so this year they're going to be a little more little more two Gap up front because they do have some guys who are in that kind of three and a quarter 315 range at the defensive tackle position I think Penn State is going to be really good off the edge with Deni Dennis Sutton and then also Abdul Carter coming off and ripping off the edge I think they're really good at safety they have some inexperience at corner now the Penn State program does recruit Corners extremely well and West Virginia at least last year doesn't really have guys who scare you at the receiver position so this could in theory be a good game for them to kind of ease into last year they shut down that mountainer offense pretty well you know and offensively for Penn State I mean they scored 38 last year that was an offense that over the course of the Season wasn't good enough obviously it's why they made a change there at offensive coordinator I think if you're a NY Lions fan the most encouraging thing that you've seen so far in the season is that Nevada installed basically the same offense that you did with far less Personnel had their starting quarterback missed the game and then gave TCU a whole bunch or or sorry SMU a whole bunch of trouble for like 45 minutes in that ball game so if I'm watching that as a Penn State fan like maybe this is something we can install pretty quickly they got great backs I I I think this could work all right so I know that bud doesn't want us to give away the goods here on a Tuesday we need to direct him to Thursday if you really want the pcks if you want the locks you got to come join us 1100 a.m. eastern time youtube.com/ cover3 for our very best bets but what about a prediction what about a hunch let's go uh Tom Bud Danny give me your sense of how this game plays out it can be as much of a game score a total or if you want to be that specific again we'll save our very best bets for Thursday at 11:00 a.m. eastern time but as we sit here um several days away from the game Tom how do you think this game plays out I mean I there are a couple interesting aspects to this matchup that I don't even think we've brought up yet like we we talked about Penn State a lot but on the other side of the ball this is a West Virginia team that I just have a lot of question marks about I know they were one of the bigger surprises last season and going to Morgantown I don't care who you are it is always challenging particularly if it's the first game of the season because you know the crowd is going to be hyped you know it's going to be a difficult environment for both the offense and defense to operate in but I'm going to name I'm going to read a list of names here okay these are the quarterbacks that West Virginia beat last season Phil jurkovich Baron Morton who came in after Tyler Shu got injured early in the Texas Tech game Chandler Morris John Reese plumbley Jake rettl a backup at Baylor Emy Jones and Sawyer Robertson that was not exactly a murderer row of QBs that West Virginia was going up against last season so I'm not sure how good that team was despite its records so well I think this is going to be a difficult situation for Penn State I I'm pretty confident that nitty lions are going to win this one the only question will be how good does that offense look with a new install and a new playbook how quickly to they show and the one concern I have I mentioned how great the offense was for Andy cotal Nikki at Kansas he had very mobile quarterbacks at Kansas Drew Aller has a lot of talents I don't know he can move around I don't consider him to be a dual threat type so how different does it look with a quarterback who maybe isn't considered a rushing Threat by most opposing defenses Tom you mentioned quarterbacks I I totally agree with you like the the Slate of quarterbacks that the Mountaineers faced was just that it was kind of hollow right but I want to focus on the West Virginia quarterback Garrett green about a third of the way through the season West Virginia made some pretty important changes last year and they basically went all NBA Style all right dunks in threes only can't read a defense can't throw over the Middle Field we don't care all right just go deep throw screens run around make it work won nine ball game I'm serious like if you look at the passing chart yeah there's a huge big circle in the middle of field they just don't throw to and that's great coaching if you know your guy can do something I think Neil Brown's a hell of a coach I just think it's hard to get you know talent to uh to Morgan West Virginia but now everybody's got film on that okay and Penn State's got athletes that can run with you has garri green expanded what he can do has this Mountaineer offense expanded what it can do around him so that you can't just key in on that stuff under the definition for Moxy in the in the uh Webster dictionary there is a picture of Garrett green I mean that's what he I mean he's not the biggest dude he's like 5'11 he just figures out a way to do it I was watching video of him working out out this off season he looks like his mechanics are pretty strong I think this is a fourth quarter game I think and one thing that I learned personally the really hard way was when we go through the win loss we do our win totals and you start just chalking up dubs dubs dubs dubs it's hard to win on the road in college football specifically I think Penn State is the more talented team I think they probably pull away but I think this will be a tightly contested game in the fourth quarter where all of a sudden it's gut check time too the other assumption is that col ncky I think hit it he had a running quarterback Drew Aller does not love to run what does that look like timing continuity and can one player Julian Fleming is he the difference we don't know yet like there usually takes more than just one receiver to all of a sudden make a passing game work so I think there's some question marks I can't wait to see from Penn State and by the way how many teams are in the pig 12 last year how many teams last year 14 right just remember that was the calling card I'm going to send this video to Neil Brown Tom Fornelli like I don't know but I don't know that's all he needs Neil Brown just needs a little bit of motivation breakout season for him watch out Dan I think the other reason to believe this will be close in the fourth quarter is that this offense specifically like this Kansas version of this cotal Nikki offense which Penn State's going to run it operates at a really low Tempo I mean there's a pretty good chance that both teams will only had like five six maybe seven drives entering the fourth quarter so it's almost imposs it's like an NFL style Tempo nowadays if you're only getting 50 plays it's hard to blow the doors off somebody if the if the teams are kind of Fairly even on athletes so I I agree with you I think it probably will be closed for a good bit of the game I don't think they're even on athletes and I don't think you need to blow the doors off them to cover a spread give me Penn State minus the points I say they win this thing by double digits coming up on the other side we got a standalone game on Sunday night USC LSU it's in Las Vegas we got new quarterbacks on both sides of the ball after a departure of two Heisman Trophy winners and we got a lot of intrigue for both of these teams in terms of whether they'll be a factor in their respective conferences we'll go inside the matchup USC and LSU all that and more next [Music]