Penn State’s defense has a short memory job to do this week, and D’Anton Lynn isn’t pretending otherwise.
Three days after the Nittany Lions were gashed for 506 yards in a loss to Northwestern, the defensive coordinator addressed what went wrong, what has to change and what Saturday’s White Out matchup with USC will demand from his group. The biggest problem, he said, started up front.
After grading the film, Lynn pointed straight to Penn State’s inability to control the line of scrimmage as the central issue in the Wildcats’ 413-yard rushing performance.
“I don’t know if we won the line of scrimmage once,” Lynn said. “We didn't lose every time, but we didn't win at all.”
That failure showed up in the form of multiple runs longer than 30 yards, several of them tied to missed tackles. Still, Lynn didn’t sound ready to abandon his defense. He said “everyone has done a lot of good things,” while stressing that the unit’s next step has to be cleaning up the basics.
“I would just say the biggest thing is just consistency,” Lynn said. “Consistency in our fits and tackling.”
Penn State’s response, in Lynn’s view, starts with flexibility. If the defense needs different personnel or different alignments, he wants the staff to be willing to adjust and put players in the best possible spots.
“If we have to move guys around, we have to get the different looks,” Lynn said. “We have to put guys in different spots, getting different looks, but put those guys in position to win.”
The timing of this week’s game adds another layer. Lynn spent the 2024-25 seasons at USC before arriving in Happy Valley, and he has already seen starting quarterback Jayden Maiava in practice. But he also knows Lincoln Riley’s offense can be a headache even when you think you have it mapped out.
“He doesn’t have a playbook, he just has plays, and he’s gonna do what his guys do best,” Lynn said. “There's times where he'll present things, and it's like, man, you just don't have an answer for us. You have to keep them guessing.”
USC comes in off a close win over Washington and will be the first top-25 opponent Penn State has faced this season. For Lynn, that means the focus has to stay on the essentials: third down, the red zone, run defense and limiting explosive plays.
“We need to be great on third down,” Lynn said. “We need to be great in the red zone, and we need to stop the run and then don't give them chunk plays.”
Lynn also explained a change he made during Friday night’s game. He had coached from the booth in Penn State’s first four games, a setup that had been debated during fall camp. Against Northwestern, he started upstairs again but moved to the sideline after halftime.
“It was just hard to watch from up top,” Lynn said. “Just not being down there with the guys and being able to talk to them, look them in the eye. You don't know what's going on down there, so it just felt better being down there while all that was going on.”
He still hasn’t decided where he’ll coach from against USC, but he made it clear that the sideline gave him a different feel for the game.
“I just felt better being down there, just making sure, regardless of what the circumstances are, regardless of what's going on on defense, regardless of what's going on on offense,” Lynn said. “When we go out there we have to have the same mentality.”
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James Franklin has pointed to consistency and physicality as the main concerns, and linebacker Cael Brezina has echoed that message from the defensive side. With USC next on the schedule, the coaching staff is leaning into more physical practices and a return to fundamentals, hoping that the group can sharpen the details before the Big Ten grind raises the stakes even further. [Read more 🡒]