STATE COLLEGE — Drew Allar shouldered blame Saturday for the second defeat of his career as Penn State’s starting quarterback, a 24-15 loss to No. 2 Michigan at beaver Stadium.
Allar, a 6-5, 242-pound sophomore quarterback, completed just 10-of-22 passes for 70 yards and one touchdown in the final two minutes. He missed open receivers and rushed several throws.
“Not good enough,” Allar said when asked to assess his performance.
Three weeks ago at Ohio State, he was 18-for-42 for 191 yards and another late TD in a 20-12 loss. He was emotional that afternoon and blamed himself for that defeat.
Penn State coach James Franklin said afterwards that offensive coordinator Mike Yurcich, without mentioning him by name, has to do a better job of finding easy passes for Allar to gain confidence.
“We have to do a better job of calling a game that allows a quarterback to get into rhythm,” Franklin said. “That is critical. We have to find easy completions for a quarterback to get into a rhythm. That’s what everybody does. We gotta do a good job of that.”
Allar was sacked just once, but he was under pressure on several other downs when he rushed several of his passes.
“I missed plenty of those (throws) today,” Allar said. “I think about the fourth-and-5 in the beginning of the game. I threw it behind Kaden (Saunders). He won on his route. I just have to put it out in front of him and let him run after the catch.”
Tight ends Theo Johnson, who caught an 8-yard touchdown pass from Allar, and Tyler Warren offered their support for Allar, who has thrown for 21 scores and one interception.
“He is a very mature player right now,” Warren said. “Obviously I want to have his back and be there for him, but I don’t think he’s a guy that’s gonna let it affect him in the upcoming week.”
Johnson said he still believes Allar has a lot of potential.
“I have tremendous respect for Drew and am so excited to see what’s to come from him,” Johnson said. “He’s a really talented kid. He’s had to learn twice the hard way this year.”
Conversion passes fail: Penn State tried a pair of two-point conversions, one after Allar’s 11-yard touchdown run in the first quarter that cut it to 14-9 and one after his 8-yard TD pass to Johnson that trimmed it to 24-15 with 1:59 left.
Allar threw incompletions on both conversion attempts.
“Being able to go for two would have allowed us to get within a field goal,” Franklin said about the first miss. “I felt that points were going to be at a premium. We used the analytics and conversations as a staff.”
He never addressed the second miss. If the Lions had kicked the extra point to make it 24-16, it would have kept them within one score and in the game before they tried an onside kick.
Rushing Wolverines: Michigan didn’t rush for 418 yards against Penn State like it did last year but its ground game was very effective.
The Wolverines finished with 227 rushing yards on 46 carries, including 33 on consecutive downs from late in the second quarter until the end of the game.
Blake Corum ran 26 times for 145 yards and two touchdowns.
“We realized that they were bringing in more linemen,” Lions defensive end Adisa Isaac said. “Obviously (through) film study and stuff, you kind of pick up what they’re trying to do. But at the end of the day, we knew we had to stop the run regardless of what it was. So we just got to be better.”
Injury report: Penn State defensive end Chop Robinson returned to action after missing the last two games with an undisclosed injury. Robinson started and had one quarterback hurry.
Amin Vanover, another Lions defensive end, was available after missing last week’s win at Maryland, but he did not play.
Wide receiver Trey Wallace, who suffered an upper-body injury two weeks ago against Indiana, missed his second straight game.
Honorary captains: Former Penn State linebacker Sean Lee and longtime equipment manager Brad “Spider” Caldwell served as honorary captains for the Nittany Lions.
Source: Berkshire mont