Penn State has not opened conference play at home since 2015 (and has only done so once in the past 13 seasons). And, in all but one of those contests, the Nittany Lions either lost outright, or was in a battle going into the fourth quarter. The Lone exception, of course, was the 59-0 shellacking of Maryland in 2019. Opening Big Ten play on the road and barely coming out with a victory is a tradition as entrenched as the Whiteout at this point.
The eighth iteration of the traditional “open conference play on the road” game, the Nittany Lions saw themselves playing the same script they’ve seen over and over again.