Through 10 games of the 2024 season, Penn State football has 12 total turnovers. Jaylen Reed leads the Nittany Lions with three of eight total interceptions, and he’s accounted for one of the team’s four fumble recoveries.
While creating 12 turnovers, the Nittany Lions have given up the ball nine times. Drew Allar has thrown five interceptions, Beau Pribula has thrown one, and Penn State has lost three fumbles so far this season.
The 12 turnovers gained and nine turnovers lost put Penn State at No. 46 in the country in turnover margin with a 0.30 margin per game, according to SportsSource analytics. This week, the Nittany Lions face Minnesota, which sits at No. 7 in turnover margin with 20 gained and 12 lost, according to the same metric.
While the turnover margin is both an offensive and defensive statistic, Franklin said his defense’s ability to create turnovers is an area that will be especially critical in the upcoming matchup with the Golden Gophers.
“We’re playing some of the best defense in all of college football right now, and there’s always going to be something that is an area you need to get better in,” Franklin said. “[Turnovers] are an area where we would love to take the next step and get better there because those things change games.”
In order to take the “next step,” Franklin said that the defense needs to come down with a few more 50/50 balls and lean into “shots on goal,” where the second man to the play tries to jar the ball loose.
Creating turnovers on defense and being tight with the ball on offense isn’t only being emphasized this week, though, as Franklin said explosive plays and turnover rates are the two most important statistics in football, and they’re looked at every week.
“When we hire new coaches, one of the non-negotiables is that we’re going to work ball security every single day as a period, and we’re going to work on ball disruption every single day as a period,” Franklin said. “It’s not something we’re going to do differently this week, it’s something we’re constantly talking about.”
On the offensive side of the ball, the Nittany Lions will be going up against another top passing defense in the Big Ten. In the same way that creating turnovers isn’t necessarily going to lead to a difference in the way the team prepares, Franklin said Allar and the offense will have to continue taking care of the ball.
The Golden Gophers run primarily zone defense, which can lead to an increased ability to watch the quarterback as they make their reads.
“There’s a very big difference in my mind between aggressiveness in zone coverage and going after the ball and aggressiveness in man coverage,” Franklin said. “That’s a hard skill to develop.”
While the Nittany Lions have only given up six interceptions this year, Franklin knows a Minnesota team with 16 interceptions will be another tough challenge.
But, it’s something that’s constantly practiced, and both sides of the ball understand the importance.
“A lot of the well-coached teams understand that before you can learn to win, you’ve got to learn how not to lose. You put the game in jeopardy by playing sloppy football,” Franklin said. “We won’t emphasize it more this week, because it’s just one of our staples that we’re going to talk about and work on every single week and every single day.”
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CJ is a senior finance major and is Onward State’s sports editor. He is from Northumberland, Pa, just east of State College. CJ is an avid Pittsburgh sports fan but chooses to ignore the Pirates’ existence. For the occasional random retweet and/or bad take, follow @CDoebler on Twitter. All complaints can be sent to [email protected].
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