Written by Bill Bender at Sporting News.com
How did that Rose Bowl Game feel?
It wasn’t a College Football Playoff semifinal. You could label it with buzz phrases such as “meaningless exhibitions,” because that’s the cool thing to do. Or you could just watch it again. And again after that.
No. 5 Penn State and No. 9 USC put on a show in the Rose Bowl Game in Pasadena, Calif., one that makes the short list of the greatest games in “The Granddaddy of Them All.”
Greatest bowl games, too. How high is subject to debate, but this next part isn’t even close to an argument. USC beat Penn State 52-49 in the highest-scoring Rose Bowl of all time, and it sure didn’t look like one of those “meaningless exhibitions.”
It meant something to both programs. The Trojans opened the season with a 52-6 loss to Alabama, the program’s worst loss in 50 years. USC closed the season with 10 wins and its 25th Rose Bowl victory, a game embroidered in the Trojans’ program since the first Rose Bowl victory in 1923. That win happened to be against Penn State, a program looking for one more signature win this season under James Franklin. This was the Big Ten champion-who-couldn’t-but-did-anyway in a season that helped the program take another step toward moving away from the Jerry Sandusky scandal.
The game didn’t disappoint. USC quarterback Sam Darnold and Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley combined for 50 pass attempts, 414 passing yards and five touchdowns in the first half alone. The Trojans led 27-21 at that point.
Penn State scored three touchdowns on three offensive plays as part of a 28-point third quarter. Saquon Barkley’s 79-yard touchdown run started that flurry, and it was quickly followed by Chris Godwin’s 72-yard touchdown on a tipped pass. McSorley and Barkley — both Heisman Trophy candidates heading into 2017 — scored touchdown runs to build a 49-35 heading into the fourth quarter.
That’s when USC’s Sam Darnold, yet another Heisman candidate for next season who had 453 passing yards and five TDs, led the Trojans to 17 unanswered points. JuJu Smith-Schuster’s one-handed catch, Michael Hutchings’ third-down stop and Leon McQuay’s interception were part of the flurry.
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