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I think the reason all Penn State fans will remember McSorley with such fond and flooding emotions themselves is the way he never allowed instinctive reactions – anger or resentment or vengeance or frustration – to affect his play. You can say he was a competitor and that’s right. You could say he was a fighter and that tenacity is sort of made of emotional qualities.
But what he’s really been is an optimist. McSorley isn’t just steady Eddie. He’s the sort of person who imagines solutions. What a guy to have around in a world where unseen impediments so constantly and unpredictably come crashing into one’s path.
That’s what sports are. That’s what college football really is. And that’s why you’ll never see another guy quite like #9 walk into and out of Beaver Stadium again. He’s the ultimate guy you want on your team to find a way to win when it’s hard.
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But the measure of McSorley will always be the can-do attitude when matters looked bleakest. Two came to mind and I asked him about each. Because it isn’t games like this walkover against Maryland that people will remember when he’s gone. It’ll be the comebacks he ignited when the Lions absolutely had to have them.
The first that popped to mind was the 2016 Big Ten championship game against Wisconsin and a pair of crunching hits he absorbed. The first was a bad snap that flew over his head in which he was drilled into the turf trying to recover it. That ended in a scoop-n-score for a 21-7 Badger lead.
And it got worse. McSorley soon after was crunched by a sandwich sack from T.J. Watt and Vince Biegel that left him dazed. He fumbled with the Lions already down 28-7.
I asked McSorley if he recalled what he thought at that moment:
“Just to get up and keep fightin’. That’s all I remember, especially after I’d gotten hit like that. It took me a second to get up. But once I got up, it was just to keep moving forward to the next plays, to do what we needed to do to get back on track. There was no 21-point play.”
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The other game I chose to ask McSorley about was the Minnesota game much earlier that season.
The Lions were 2-2, had lost the 42-39 fireworks display with Pitt at Heinz and then that horrific 49-10 loss at Michigan with an injured and undermanned offensive line and linebacker corps.
They couldn’t lose to Minnesota. But down 13-3 in a cold rain in the third quarter, they were. Memories of that point of that game are hazy more than two years later. But you can say that was the point when McSorley and Saquon Barkley virtually willed the entire program’s fate in a different direction. Lose that game and it all could have come apart.
What does McSorley recall of that day now, 33 games later?
“I remember everyone booing us. I remember all the [chants] about ‘Fire Franklin!’ and all that type of stuff. I remember that and I can hear ‘em in my head like it was yesterday.”
What was McSorley’s reaction to that in specific?
“It was more like a: ‘We’ve gotta get this fixed’ type of reaction.”
McSorley’s bomb to Irv Charles revived the Lions and registered a pulse in their offense. But with less than a minute left, they were still down a field goal with more than 50 yards to cover to get in range and no timeouts remaining.
“That drive, that was the first time I really remember people saying, ‘You had to have doubt.’ But you couldn’t have told one person on that sideline or in that huddle that we weren’t gonna go score.”
McSorley’s heart-stopping diagonal scramble across the field and out of bounds set up a pressure 40-yard field goal by Tyler Davis to force overtime followed by a Barkley TD that ended it, 29-26.
“We’d had so many situations up to then where we’d fight back, fight back, fight back and then lose,” McSorley said. “That time we fought back and won. That was when we broke through that barrier.”
Make no mistake: Penn State broke through what was a program barrier because McSorley would not allow them to submit. That unsinkable nature is what didn’t just win games but made winning a new habit.
Enjoying McSorley’s play has been about that: Seeing him figure out solutions under pressure, often in dire circumstance.
Of course, McSorley didn’t always succeed. But he always seemed to act with faith that he would. You finish watching with a smile of wonder, a shake of the head and a question: From what soul does such belief emerge?
The best part of watching sports is subliminally imagining oneself in all the same situations the people in uniform face. Wondering how we’d react. Pretending we’d have the guts to face them down and find a way through, as do our favorites in uniform.
I guess that’s the greatest loss in seeing Trace McSorley’s Penn State career come to a close. We won’t be able to take that ride with him again.
...
I think the reason all Penn State fans will remember McSorley with such fond and flooding emotions themselves is the way he never allowed instinctive reactions – anger or resentment or vengeance or frustration – to affect his play. You can say he was a competitor and that’s right. You could say he was a fighter and that tenacity is sort of made of emotional qualities.
But what he’s really been is an optimist. McSorley isn’t just steady Eddie. He’s the sort of person who imagines solutions. What a guy to have around in a world where unseen impediments so constantly and unpredictably come crashing into one’s path.
That’s what sports are. That’s what college football really is. And that’s why you’ll never see another guy quite like #9 walk into and out of Beaver Stadium again. He’s the ultimate guy you want on your team to find a way to win when it’s hard.
...
But the measure of McSorley will always be the can-do attitude when matters looked bleakest. Two came to mind and I asked him about each. Because it isn’t games like this walkover against Maryland that people will remember when he’s gone. It’ll be the comebacks he ignited when the Lions absolutely had to have them.
The first that popped to mind was the 2016 Big Ten championship game against Wisconsin and a pair of crunching hits he absorbed. The first was a bad snap that flew over his head in which he was drilled into the turf trying to recover it. That ended in a scoop-n-score for a 21-7 Badger lead.
And it got worse. McSorley soon after was crunched by a sandwich sack from T.J. Watt and Vince Biegel that left him dazed. He fumbled with the Lions already down 28-7.
I asked McSorley if he recalled what he thought at that moment:
“Just to get up and keep fightin’. That’s all I remember, especially after I’d gotten hit like that. It took me a second to get up. But once I got up, it was just to keep moving forward to the next plays, to do what we needed to do to get back on track. There was no 21-point play.”
...
The other game I chose to ask McSorley about was the Minnesota game much earlier that season.
The Lions were 2-2, had lost the 42-39 fireworks display with Pitt at Heinz and then that horrific 49-10 loss at Michigan with an injured and undermanned offensive line and linebacker corps.
They couldn’t lose to Minnesota. But down 13-3 in a cold rain in the third quarter, they were. Memories of that point of that game are hazy more than two years later. But you can say that was the point when McSorley and Saquon Barkley virtually willed the entire program’s fate in a different direction. Lose that game and it all could have come apart.
What does McSorley recall of that day now, 33 games later?
“I remember everyone booing us. I remember all the [chants] about ‘Fire Franklin!’ and all that type of stuff. I remember that and I can hear ‘em in my head like it was yesterday.”
What was McSorley’s reaction to that in specific?
“It was more like a: ‘We’ve gotta get this fixed’ type of reaction.”
McSorley’s bomb to Irv Charles revived the Lions and registered a pulse in their offense. But with less than a minute left, they were still down a field goal with more than 50 yards to cover to get in range and no timeouts remaining.
“That drive, that was the first time I really remember people saying, ‘You had to have doubt.’ But you couldn’t have told one person on that sideline or in that huddle that we weren’t gonna go score.”
McSorley’s heart-stopping diagonal scramble across the field and out of bounds set up a pressure 40-yard field goal by Tyler Davis to force overtime followed by a Barkley TD that ended it, 29-26.
“We’d had so many situations up to then where we’d fight back, fight back, fight back and then lose,” McSorley said. “That time we fought back and won. That was when we broke through that barrier.”
Make no mistake: Penn State broke through what was a program barrier because McSorley would not allow them to submit. That unsinkable nature is what didn’t just win games but made winning a new habit.
Enjoying McSorley’s play has been about that: Seeing him figure out solutions under pressure, often in dire circumstance.
Of course, McSorley didn’t always succeed. But he always seemed to act with faith that he would. You finish watching with a smile of wonder, a shake of the head and a question: From what soul does such belief emerge?
The best part of watching sports is subliminally imagining oneself in all the same situations the people in uniform face. Wondering how we’d react. Pretending we’d have the guts to face them down and find a way through, as do our favorites in uniform.
I guess that’s the greatest loss in seeing Trace McSorley’s Penn State career come to a close. We won’t be able to take that ride with him again.
