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Penguins’ next test Saturday vs. Redbirds
Penguins’ next test
Saturday vs. Redbirds
By Joe Scalzo
YOUNGSTOWN
When Youngstown State’s football team is on the road, tight end Shane Kuhn devotes Friday nights in his hotel room to film study.
Of deer.
“He sits there and watching his hunting videos,” said his roommate, senior tight end Nate Adams. “He’s pretty depressed he’s not back there in [Vandergrift] Pa., shooting archery.”
Adams, who hails from Newark, Ohio, is also a hunter, although the only animals he has time to target in the fall are defensive ends and linebackers.
That’s fine with him.
“I won’t be upset if I miss all of hunting season, that’s for sure,” Adams said. “Especially under these circumstances. My last year here, I’d like to go out with a bang. I’ll have plenty of time to hunt the rest of my life.”
Thanks to three straight conference wins, the Penguins (7-2, 4-1 Missouri Valley) are in the hunt for their first playoff appearance since 2006. Standing in their way are three ranked teams, starting with Saturday’s game at 12th-ranked Illinois State.
“This is the best team to date we’ll have played,” YSU coach Eric Wolford.
The Penguins blasted Illinois State 59-21 in last year’s meeting at Stambaugh Stadium, but the Redbirds (7-1, 4-1 MVFC) are a much better team at home, where they have won 10 straight games.
YSU has not won at Hancock Stadium since 2006 and the last two losses have been particularly painful. In 2012, the Penguins blew a 28-7 lead en route to a 35-28 loss. And in 2010, Illinois State connected on a 40-yard touchdown with 0.7 seconds left to beat YSU 41-39.
“You know, it’s just a new year,” said Wolford, when asked about not winning at Hancock. “We don’t talk about the past.”
The Penguins have been one of the Missouri Valley’s better road teams of late, winning six of the last seven games dating back to November of 2012. They are 2-0 this season with wins at Missouri State and South Dakota State.
“I can’t attribute it to anything specifically, other than just having some good fortune and preparing,” Wolford said of the road success. “I like being on the road. I like having the guys in my possession on Thursday and Friday night. I think I have their focus and their attention and I’m around them a lot more. When we’re at home, we just have them for about three-and-a-half to four hours on a Friday, as opposed to having them with you all day.”
When asked about Adams and Kuhn watching hunting videos, Wolford said, “Yeah, I don’t wander into those guys’ room. With those two guys, you never know. It’s a different group of guys, there.”
A win on Saturday would give the Penguins five conference wins for the second straight year. Considering the MVFC’s dominance this season — Valley teams went 23-1 against the rest of the FCS and hold eight of the country’s top 20 teams in this week’s Gridiron Power Index — that might be enough for YSU to secure a playoff spot.
But Wolford would rather win out and secure the league’s automatic playoff bid than put his fate in the hands of the playoff committee.
“We’ve been down that road,” said Wolford, whose team fell one win short of the postseason each of the last three years. “You know how committees are. We can argue about that for years.”