STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — No. 19 Nebraska won a game its coach thought should have been called off.
Rex Burkhead ran for 121 yards and a touchdown and Nebraska held off Penn State’s fourth-quarter rally to beat the 12th-ranked Nittany Lions 17-14 on Saturday in the first game since legendary coach Joe Paterno was fired because of a child sex-abuse scandal involving a former Nittany Lions defensive coordinator.
It also was a surreal day for the Cornhuskers, who prayed at midfield before the game with their opponents. But when it ended, coach Bo Pelini’s team came away with a win it had to have. The victory kept Nebraska (8-2, 4-2) — playing its first season in the Big Ten Conference — a game behind Michigan State in the Legends Division.
Penn State’s high-profile turmoil began last weekend with the arrest of former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky on 40 counts of sex abuse and ended with the Nittany Lions (8-2, 5-1) losing their first game of the post-Paterno era.
Paterno, the winningest major-college football coach ever, was fired Wednesday night, ousted because he apparently failed to do more about a 2002 rape allegation against Sandusky than pass it up the chain of command to his bosses.
“I’ll be honest with you, going into this football game, I didn’t think the game should have been played — for a lot of different reasons,” Pelini said. “I look at my job as a football coach is to educate, and to prepare the kids that come into the program for life. I thought that this game was an opportunity. The situation that’s going on is bigger than football.”
That was obvious before the game when the teams met at midfield, players dropping to a knee as a moment of silence was observed at Beaver Stadium.
“It was very overwhelming,” said Nebraska sophomore quarterback Taylor Martinez. “I got the chills the entire time. I thought it was an awesome experience.”
The Nittany Lions scored 14 points on two second-half touchdown runs by tailback Stephfon Green. But Nebraska’s defense stepped up and ended a Penn State drive by stopping tailback Silas Redd on a fourth-and-1 play with 1:49 left at Penn State’s 38-yard line.
Most Nittany Lions fans heeded calls for a “blueout,” wearing the school’s familiar dark blue in support of victims of child sexual abuse. Fans formed the outline of a blue ribbon in the student section.
“We are . . . Penn State,” roared the crowd through the afternoon, the signature State College cheer.
But this school’s identity has forever changed.
Sandusky, who has maintained through his attorney that he is innocent, is accused of molesting eight boys over 15 years, with some of the assaults occurring on Penn State property. The school’s president and Paterno have been ousted. Its athletic director and a vice president have been charged with perjury and failing to report a crime.
“I think today just made the healing process start to begin,” said interim coach Tom Bradley, Paterno’s replacement.
The last time Penn State played a game at Beaver Stadium, on Oct. 29, Paterno was feted by now former university president Graham Spanier for his 409th career victory, the most in Division I history.
Paterno started at Penn State as an assistant in 1950 and took over as head coach in 1966. Saturday was Penn State’s first game without Paterno on the staff since Nov. 19, 1949, a 19-0 loss at Pittsburgh.
For the Cornhuskers, another loss would have made getting to the first Big Ten championship game very difficult.
“Now we’re kind of taking it a game at a time,” Martinez said. “We’re hoping to get to that Big Ten championship.”
