As losses continue to mount for Penn State — now losers of five straight Big Ten games, its longest conference skid since 2020 — interim head coach Terry Smith continues to emphasize one word: opportunity.
Smith used a variation of the word 11 times during his Monday press conference as he looked ahead to this weekend’s matchup with No. 2 Indiana.
It was classic coach speak — the idea that players have a chance to make the most of their situations, potentially opening doors for future success.
The problem is that Smith’s optimism rarely translates to the field.
Before the Ohio State game, Smith spoke about the need to push the ball vertically in the passing game:
“Obviously, there is always chatter about how we’ve got to throw the ball down the field, and we do want to take calculated risks down the field and throw the ball,” he said. “We have these young receivers — we’re going to give those guys an opportunity to inject some life into the pass group. You know, Ethan Grunkemeyer is the new quarterback at the helm. There’s just a lot of dynamics with the pass game. I do think we’ll be able to throw the ball a little bit better this week at Ohio State. I’m demanding from Coach (Andy) Kotelnicki that we are creative in the pass game in the sense that we don’t want to throw the ball so much horizontally, but we want to throw it vertically.”
The results were the opposite of what Smith envisioned.
According to Pro Football Focus, Penn State’s average depth of target was just 6.6 yards per pass attempt — a figure that falls below the threshold for vertical efficiency.
Anything under seven yards is generally considered vertically poor.
While Penn State narrowly edged Ohio State in ADOT (6.6 to 6.47), it was the Buckeyes’ explosiveness that made the difference. Carnell Tate posted an elite 18.8-yard ADOT, and Jeremiah Smith followed with 15.5.
Per PFF, anything above 13 yards is considered an elite ADOT for a receiver who regularly challenges defenses vertically.
Among Penn State’s receivers, Koby Howard’s lone target was charted at 24 yards by PFF — the rest of the wideouts averaged just 7.1 yards per target.
Smith acknowledged the challenge of getting Howard and Tyseer Denmark on the field consistently:
“There are 50 different personnel groups, and there are certain guys you want for certain plays,” he said. “Some you can’t just plug-and-play. Once again, to my explanation earlier, the young guys don’t know the entire playbook. You have to be selective with what plays they can handle, and that’s the challenge with those guys.”
It’s difficult to fully understand those explanations when Smith preaches opportunity but seemingly hesitates to act on it — especially when the defense is showing more willingness to rotate young players despite mistakes.
Linebacker Amare Campbell addressed the defensive miscues, noting that most errors have been post-snap rather than communication-related:
“There’s nothing to do with pre-snap communication,” Campbell said. “It’s post-snap. Everything is post-snap. Whatever you’re keying pre-snap changes post-snap, and you have to adjust. A lot of stuff like that.”
Consider the contrast: Howard and Denmark combined for just six pass snaps and eight total offensive plays.
Meanwhile, on defense, freshmen Chaz Coleman, Yvan Kemajou and Alex Tatsch combined for 65 snaps.
Despite those efforts, the defense forced only one punt outside of end-of-half and victory formations against Ohio State’s potent offense.
The defense has surrendered 400 or more yards of total offense in three of their past five games.
Opportunities are being opened on the defensive side of the ball, and yet we have seen the same results during the five-game losing streak.
So the question remains: if Smith truly believes in opportunity, why isn’t he extending it to the young playmakers on offense who might actually give Penn State a chance to win?
Until Smith matches his message with his rotations on offense, ‘opportunity’ will remain just another word.
