With the 2025 Penn State football squad appearing to be preseason favorites to win the program’s first national championship since 1986, past big game woes came back into question at 2025 Big Ten Media Days at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas with senior quarterback Drew Allar facing the questions.
Allar defended his program, praising its consistency throughout his time and head coach James Franklin’s time but was pressed on the two biggest misses of the 2024 season: the 2024 Big Ten Championship against No. 1 Oregon and the College Football Playoff Semifinal at the Orange Bowl against Notre Dame.
Both were within Penn State’s reach and both times Penn State came up short.
Allar began reflecting on the miss against Oregon where he had two killer interceptions in an eight-point loss.
“Yeah, I think the Oregon game specifically, I played well in for the most part, but there was two costly mistakes, obviously, the first interception, we were down what like 21-10 at that point, I threw an interception, which was basically a pick six, since they got out of the one. It was one play like run, like half that dive or whatever. So now we’re down 28-10,” Allar said.
Allar’s second interception came on Penn State’s final play on a potential game tying drive where Penn State halted Oregon to a three-and-out on their previous possession and had two minutes to drive.
On Penn State’s first play, running back Nicholas Singleton rushed for nine yards, setting up a second and short. Penn State dialed up a deep shot that Oregon defender Nikko Reed intercepted to seal the win.
Allar reflected on positives and recognized the negatives that came from him against Oregon.
“The thing I took from that game is the way we battled back, like we came back and rattled off two scores so but again, like, if I don’t have those two costly interceptions, maybe it’s a different outcome for us,” he said. “And because we were having a pretty good game offensively. From that standpoint, I was playing pretty well, besides, like, maybe, like five or six plays.”
The biggest miss for Allar in 2024 came on his final play of the season against Notre Dame.
Penn State was tied with the Fighting Irish at 24, with under a minute to go, the game was destined for overtime.
After Singleton had an explosive 13-yard run, Penn State decided to try to push to end the game in regulation.
Allar’s first read on this fateful play was to tight end Tyler Warren and Warren was blanketed by Irish defenders.
As Allar attempted to throw it away, he didn’t get low enough in the dirt away from Irish defenders and Christian Grey made the interception setting up a game winning field goal.
Allar reflected on the play.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.“I mean, I’ve definitely watched that play, like a handful of times,” he said. “I don’t know the number, but for me again, like the mistakes that I made in that game, the thing that was frustrating but also good at the same time was, like all the mistakes I did make were very correctable and easy.”
“It’s just about being intentional with those things. And for me, like just being conscious of those things. Maybe I didn’t know throughout the season that I was doing some certain stuff. So now, when I am in the off season, I like hammering those things down. So when those moments and games do come, like bad habits or stuff like that, don’t show up in the most critical moment where it does cost us in that sort of way.”
As Allar recognized Penn State having to reverse the course and get over the hump in big games against big time opponents, he relishes the opportunity to be in those situations.
“I wanted to come to Penn State to play in those types of games, and am looking forward to it again, kind of just having one more go at it for my senior year.”
