Penn State Pulls Away Late to Defeat the Bulls, 27-14

Saturday, September 12

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Penn State

Penn State Pulls Away Late to Defeat the Bulls, 27-14

9/12/2015 12:00:00 AM | Football

Box Score

UNIVERSITY PARK, PA - The University at Buffalo, The State University of New York football team put up a good fight, but ultimately lost to Penn State, 27-14, at Beaver Stadium on a cool, rainy Saturday afternoon. The Bulls only trailed, 13-7, in the fourth quarter, but the Nittany Lions were able to pull away late to secure the victory.

The Basics

Score: Penn State 27, Buffalo 14
Records: Penn State (1-1), Buffalo (1-1)
Location: Beaver Stadium, University Park, PA
Attendance: 93,065
Weather: Rainy, 61 degrees

How It Happened

Scoring Plays

- After a scoreless first quarter, Penn State got on the board first with on 22-yard end around by Brandon Polk. The score was set up by a 58-yard punt return by DeAndre Thompkins that gave the Lions a drive start at the UB 24. They scored two plays later.

- After Penn State intercepted a tipped screen pass attempt by Joe Licata, it took over at the UB 12-yard line. The Bulls defense stood firm, forced a three-and-out, holding the Nittany Lions to a 22-yard field goal that put them ahead, 10-0 with 3:58 left in the half.

- After the teams exchanged punts to start the second half, the Bulls mounted an 11-play, 78-yard drive, capped by a Licata to Ron Willoughby 14-yard touchdown to cut the lead to 10-7. A key play on the drive was a 29-yard run by Anthone Taylor – his longest of the season.

- On their ensuing possession, the Nittany Lions responded with a 12-play, 51-yard drive and had a first and goal at the UB 4-yard line. However, the Bulls defense stuffed the Lions again and forced them to settle for a 21-yard field goal to take a 13-7 lead with 20 seconds left in the third quarter.

- Penn State scored again on its next possession to take a 20-7 lead. Saquon Barkley had runs of 33 and 17 yards during the drive. Christian Hackenberg hit DaeSean Hamilton on a quick five-yard out for the score.

- Barkley scored on a nine-yard run on Penn State's next possession to take a 27-7 lead with 9:02 left.

- The Bulls cut the lead to 27-14 with 4:38 left when Marcus McGill made a beautiful catch on a quick 10-yard out by Licata. The senior signal-caller went 8-for-9 on the drive and hit seven different receivers. Licata connected with Willoughby on a 21-yard connection on a 3^rd-and-3 to keep the drive alive.

Inside the Numbers:

- Licata finished the game 24-for-35 for 205 yards, two touchdowns and an interception. He was 17-for-21 for 159 yards in the second half alone.

-Licata hit nine different receivers in the game. Willoughby was his favorite target as the senior wide out had eight catches for 80 yards and a touchdown. McGill added four receptions for 45 yards and a score. Collin Lisa had three catches and Mason Schreck, Malcolm Robinson and Anthone Taylor each had a pair of catches.

- Anthone Taylor had a strong game, rushing for 93 yards on 18 carries for a 5.2 yards-per-carry average. Jordan Johnson rushed for 23 yards on nine attempts.

- Penn State might be known as "Linebacker U," but the Bulls proved they have a good group of linebackers as well. Okezie Alozie had seven tackles, Brandon Berry also had seven tackles and added a tackle for loss and Nick Gilbo had six tackles and two TFLs.

- The Bulls' secondary also played well. Cornerback Marqus Baker had seven tackles and two pass breakups, Boise Ross also had a pair of pass breakups to go along with five tackles. Safety Ryan Williamson had a career-high seven tackles.

- Senior punter Tyler Grassman averaged 42.1 yards on seven punts.

Key Stat

The Bulls defense contained Penn State's highly-touted quarterback Christian Hackenberg. He completed just 14-of-27 passes for 128 yards.

Game Changer

Penn State switched running backs in the second half and went with Saquon Barkley. The Nittany Lions' true freshman rushed for 115 yards on just 12 carries and scored a touchdown – all in the second half.

Nota-BULLS

- With two touchdown passes in the game, Joe Licata has now thrown a touchdown pass in 14 straight games.

- Licata passed Marty Barrett (1980-83) for third in school history in career passing yardage with 6,967 yards.

- Anthone Taylor went over 2,000 career rushing yards in the game. He joins Branden Oliver (4,049) and James Starks (3,140) as just the third UB running back in the Bulls' FBS era to rush for 2,000 yards in a career.

- The Bulls were 2-for-2 in the redzone in the game and are now a perfect 8-for-8 on the season.

- Marqus Baker (7) and Ryan Williamson (7) both had career highs in tackles on the day.

- The announced crowd of 93,065 was the third largest crowd a UB team has ever played in front of.

Quota-BULLS

Head Coach Lance Leipold

"I am very proud of our team, but I said from the start in the early time of getting this job we were not going to go into games like this just to compete. We are going to play to win. I thought we battled extremely well, we put the game exactly where we wanted it to be, with an opportunity to win in the fourth quarter. We gave up some big plays and we didn't make enough ourselves and obviously the story of the game was too many penalties. That truly did not give us the chance that we would have needed in a game like this. Credit to Penn State, but I am awfully proud of this group in where we have taken a step to put ourselves in a position heading into game three."

"I told the team not to play the helmet today, but the guy in the helmet. Penn State has done a lot for this program to give themselves a tradition and we are working on building a tradition. But at the same time, it is about who is in the helmet at this particular time."

"They may have wore us down a little bit. Again, we talked about getting the game to the second half and make it close in the fourth quarter and anything can happen. Unfortunately, the start of the fourth quarter we didn't answer when we quite needed to."

Senior Quarterback Joe Licata

"I thought they were very good; that's probably an understatement, I think they did a great job, they're relentless, I watched them on film all week and they get after guys, and they got after us a little bit today. But I thought our center and two guards did a great job on the inside. I didn't really get his that much so it was a comfortable day for me."

Redshirt-Freshman Center James O'Hagan

"We had our moments today, but overall we could have done a lot better job than what we did. It's not a matter of how well we did or not; it's a matter of how well the team did. I think that we could have done a better job today, but I mean their D-line was pretty good I thought we did an OK job. We just didn't put enough points on the board."

Senior linebacker Okezie Alozie

I can say that it's a testament to our coaches [on successful redzone defense] – coach Borland, coach Simpson, coach Edwards, etc. They do a good job of harping on it; the offense is going to get down there eventually, but that goal line has to mean something. If we can hold them from scoring and just a field goal instead of a touchdown, just little things like that. That's the things we try to do as a defense just to give us opportunity to win the game."

Junior Defensive Lineman Brandon Crawford

"I feel like the defensive line did a great job today. This week in preparation, they were really on us about stopping the run . As a defensive line up front in the first half, and going into the fourth quarter, we just did an excellent job executing what our coaches wanted."

Up Next

The Bulls will travel to Boca Raton, FL to face Florida Atlantic next Saturday. The Owls are 0-2 and are coming off a 44-20 loss to Miami (FL) on Friday night.