UNIVERSITY PARK - A capsule look at Joe Paterno's weekly press conference.
Opponent: Temple (3-0)
Kickoff: 3:30 p.m.
Last time vs. Penn State: Nittany Lions won, 31-6, at home last season
Television: Big Ten Network
Line: Penn State is favored by 15
Stress test: In light of Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio suffering a heart attack over the weekend, Paterno was asked if there's more stress involved in college coaching today. "There's stress in everything in this day and age today," JoePa said before later adding, "We're in a very public world. And if you happen to be, to get into something where there's that much interest that would be in the kind of football that they're playing in the Big Ten or in most of the conferences today that we see on television, yeah, there's stress. But I don't think it's any more than anything else."
Toughen 'em up: Players talked after Saturday's win over Kent State about how tough practice was last week. Paterno scoffed at that notion. "I think some of the guys you talked to were dreaming," he said. "We only put full pads on them once. But we put the shoulder pads on them and we were a little bit more aggressive in practice. I have felt that we were not intense enough at practice. So we tried to set a different tone."
Talking up Temple: The Owls are 3-0 with wins over Villanova (31-24), Central Michigan (13-10) and Connecticut (30-16). They have improved greatly under coach Al Golden, even if they have not scored a TD against Penn State in the past four meetings (Lions outscored them 154-9). "This is a better Temple team than any we've probably played," said Paterno, who is 26-0 against the Owls.
Hockey talk: Paterno was asked about the $88 million donation by Terry and Kim Pegula to fund a Division I hockey program and build an arena. "I think it's absolutely great," he said. He went on to add, "I felt we made a mistake in building a baseball field. I thought that should have been the ice skating rink."
Spikes who?: It's no secret JoePa wasn't happy about the baseball field addition, primarily because it took away football parking and also because his input was never sought on it. But rarely has he ever gone on record speaking about his dissatisfaction. Following his baseball field comment, he was asked if he had changed his opinion about the Spikes. "I don't care about the Spikes," he said. "I care about Penn State baseball. All right. And I think baseball up north is a tough deal ... because of the fact that people were playing year-round and we're not." He later added, "It's a good wholesome environment. It's a great facility and the whole bit. But I don't know how much it's done for our baseball."
- Compiled by Cory Giger
