MORGANTOWN — For one week at least, Penn State’s new-look offense delivered.
Drew Allar threw three touchdown passes in the second quarter, Nick Singleton rushed for 114 yards and a TD, and the No. 8 Nittany Lions beat West Virginia 34-12 on Saturday in a season opener delayed for more than two hours by lightning.
Allar and Singleton were able to generate the explosive plays that were lacking from Penn State’s offense in big games late last season and led to a change in offensive coordinators.
“We were very intentional on growing that and developing that” since Andy Kotelnicki arrived from Kansas, Allar said. “It’s fun to be in a system like that, for sure. We really prepared well throughout the week as an offense.”
Allar threw a 50-yard TD pass to Harrison Wallace and a 20-yarder to Kaytron Allen on the next series.
Just before halftime, Allar caught the Mountaineers off guard. Instead of running out the clock from deep in his own territory, he threw to a wide-open Omari Evans for 55 yards and found Wallace in the corner of the end zone on the next play from 18 yards out for a 20-6 halftime lead.
“We got to it today,” Penn State coach James Franklin said. “But we’ve got to do it week in and week out.”
Allar completed 11 of 17 passes for 216 yards. Wallace caught five passes for a career-high 117 yards, all in the first half. That was more than half of his yardage for the entire 2023 season.
Allar and Wallace are accustomed to playing well against the Mountaineers. In the opener a year ago in Happy Valley, Allar threw for three TDs in his first career start and Wallace caught seven passes in Penn State’s 38-15 win.
Shortly after the teams left the field for halftime, a band of storms passed over the stadium — leading to a lengthy delay.
Franklin said Penn State took advantage of the down time to review first-half plays on sideline tablets.
“You’re not just killing time, you’re actually watching tape, evaluating tape, grading tape,” he said. “A lot of things that we could get done during that time.”
Singleton had a 40-yard TD run to start the third quarter. He also had another 40-yard run in the fourth.
West Virginia made too many mistakes to stay in the game. On Penn State’s first series, the Mountaineers recovered a fumble at the Nittany Lions’ 28, only to give it back on the next play when the snap hit a receiver in motion and Penn State recovered.
“We played bad football,” West Virginia coach Neal Brown said. “To say I’m disappointed in how we played would be an understatement.”
The Mountaineers had the ball five times inside the Penn State 30 and came away with a touchdown and two field goals. Garrett Greene went 15 of 28 for 161 yards.
“We’ve just got to get better,” Greene said. “We’re not going to hit the panic button.”
The takeaway
Penn State: The Nittany Lions dominated the line on both sides of the ball. Allar was able to look for his receivers without much pressure. And West Virginia’s rushing attack, which was third in the FBS last season, was limited to 85 yards.
West Virginia: The Mountaineers have lost four straight season openers. That’s never happened before in 132 seasons of football. They’ve also lost seven consecutive times to ranked opponents.
Up next
West Virginia hosts FCS-level Albany next Saturday night.
