Hoosier Defense Hung Out to Dry by Lackluster Offense

Written by Evan Orris

It’s the same song and dance to open the season for IU football. 

He Hoosiers fell to the No. 4 ranked Penn State Nittany Lions 24-0 on Saturday. Per usual, the defense held strong despite injuries from numerous key contributors. However, the offense could not score and struggled once again, which hung the unit out to dry.  

The game plan this season has always been to create turnovers to set up better field position for the struggling offense. But, so far through the first four games, the Hoosiers only had one interception and four fumble recoveries.  

“We came into this game knowing that we had to take the ball back to the offense creating ways that we keep going and just keep moving the ball back to the offense and letting them work things out. We're just going to try to keep taking the ball away and keep trying to make big plays.” Linebacker Cam Jones said.

Eventually, safety Raheem Layne would snag an interception in the first quarter of the game, however, the offense was still unable to score. They were stopped on a fourth-down run inside the 10-yard line.

Later in the game, the defense would force their own turnover on downs. With their backs on the one-yard line, the defense was able to put up an impressive goal-line stand. However, that did not matter much.

Penn State quarterback Sean Clifford went to work on the defense throughout the game. Despite the one pick, Clifford threw for three touchdowns. He only threw for 178 yards, however, the duel-threat made plays with his feet by rushing for 58 yards.

“Yeah, we knew he could scramble and get out of the pocket so a few of those plays were on myself and other guys just keeping them contained in the pocket as well, but it is something we need to address,” Linebacker Micah McFadden said of Clifford. “I think some of the time we did well, and other times we fumbled some. That's something we've got to improve on.”

The secondary was already facing an uphill battle. They had to cover one of the best receivers in college football in Jahan Dotson. They also had to pay attention to his side-kick Parker Washington. The tough task got even harder moments before the game.

Just ahead of kickoff, IU announced that their star cornerback, Tiawan Mullen would be held out of the contest due to injury. Then disaster struck the secondary as other starting corner Reese Taylor went down with an injury, and then Layne did also. However, they should be okay.

But, Dotson still managed to end the day with eight catches for 84 yards and two touchdowns. He was unstoppable against the short-handed secondary. Washington added two catches for 30 yards.

“So that took a toll on that position in the secondary, but those guys battled. We got to hopefully be able to use the bye week to get those guys back and I don't see those being long term issues for those guys.” Head coach Tom Allen said.

For the team, they will hit a long reset on the season as they go into the bye week. The defense needs to make some adjustments. But, they can only go as far as their offense goes.