STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Two days before Penn State’s biggest home game of the season, Ruth Ann Bast was at a local brewery alongside a few dozen fellow Nittany Lions diehards hoping their team could snap a sobering two-game skid.

Bast was there to watch her son-in-law, Landon Tengwall, a former Penn State football player and budding local media star, preview the matchup against USC during a live show. To Bast, who has been going to Penn State football games for 50 years, Tengwall’s crowd at that warehouse-sized bar and grill epitomizes the fanbase.

“There was a little old man all like this, in really nice clothes, but he was hunched over. He has a massive collection of Penn State memorabilia. He’s sitting in the front row,” Bast said, describing the scene for visitors to her tailgate this past Saturday. “And there’s these people from Maine who had embroidered patches of Penn State stuff all over their clothes, and then there was a lady who had the Dooney & Bourke logo bag with Penn State on it, and there was about 60 to 80 people there. And these are the people that Pat Kraft has s— on.”

Despite the now-three-game losing streak, the frustration around Penn State football these days is focused more on Kraft, the school’s fourth-year athletic director, than Matt Campbell, the first-year head coach. To many fans, Kraft is the face of the rising cost of being a Penn State football fan, the person most responsible for a $700 million renovation and modernization of 66-year-old Beaver Stadium that led to an increase in ticket prices announced earlier this year.

When the work is completed in 2027, the project will add 15 executive suites and 30 loge boxes (which Penn State says have already sold out) and another 4,500 or so club seats to a stadium capacity that will remain north of 100,000. The addition of premium seating has become common at stadiums and arenas all over the country as schools and professional franchises tap into their highest-paying customers.

“We weren’t maxing out the potential of the stadium,” said Kraft, who is quick to point out premium seating will still account for less than 10 percent of available tickets.

Read the rest here for free: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7690503/2026/10/15/penn-state-football-stadium-renovation-ticket-prices/?unlocked_article_code=1.I1E.vRtj.-FxUCqf7NHAo&source=emp_shared_article&smid=url-share-ta

For those who don't know, when the students are away on break the student section becomes available for sale. The Oregon game on Jan. 2nd is the only game where this will happen this season. If you want to your kids or family to be close to the action, now's your chance to grab great seats!

NLC and Season Ticket Holders are in their pre-sale until 5pm and then the general public sale begins.

Tickets:
https://www.ticketmaster.com/penn-state-mens-basketball-vs-oregon-university-park-pennsylvania-01-02-2027/event/02006547E3A9E809

If Campbell wins this Saturday against Michigan, considering the rest of the season after it is averaged, does that save the season? Or does the rivalry game not hold that much weight?

In my opinion a win against Michigan makes up for almost all other dropped games.

Heading to the Rutgers game on 11/21. We have an overnight RV pass (where we plan to tailgate) and two reserved car spaces in Lot 31.

For anyone who’s done a similar setup, is the walk between Lot 31 and ORV manageable, or would you recommend looking for closer parking? We'll put coolers in the RV before so we don't have to carry anything excessive.

Any recommendations/tips are appreciated for coordinating an RV and 2 additional cars

Where is a good place to pre game?

TLDR: This team is victim of the new era of college football that makes your team ride or die by a handful of your best players. If Howard and Granville were healthy we'd probably be on pace for an 8/9 win season and having the depth to navigate it in the NIL/transfer portal era is not going to be something we can expect going forward.

Looking back on the summer and the analysts who followed this team closely said this team could be solid. 8-4 and 9-3 were the most common outcomes with the caveat we'd be healthy and that the lack of depth would doom us. Through the first 3 games, the team was proving that right and then we lost our best offensive weapon and our best pass rusher.

While some may say scoff at the notion that this could set the season off the rails, 80% of this team can't compete in the Big Ten. Those 2 guys could and at those positions it can buy you 2 wins against the middle/bottom of the conference. let's take a look at the losses.
Wisconsin - Does having Koby Howard get you another touchdown? Probably. But even if he doesn't, does he give you a 1st down in a 4th quarter where you didn't get a single one until the desperation drive? He absolutely does, that gives you a new set of downs, Wisconsin doesn't have the 1:35 at the end of the game to score.
You still lose northwestern.
We can argue about whether we beat USC, I think having Granville in there as a pass rusher and Howard to open up the middle of the field probably turns one of their TDs into a FG and one of our FGs into a TD, probably still lose but we need a field goal instead of TD. But I'll chalk it as a loss

So with those guys we're 4-2, and I'd be pretty optimistic about finding at least 4 more wins in the second half of the season. And that's going to be Penn State in a nutshell going forward. This era of college football really only affords 10 teams the luxury of "next man up" and building depth. It's going to be a lot like the 2021 season and this season where this will be a competitive team if your best players are healthy and if not you better brace for disappointment.

The positive thing about this is I think Campbell's "good humans" Ted Lasso style of coaching is going to be able to help you from cratering into a 7-8 loss season when those injuries happen. But...also we're going to have to kiss the stable floor of 9 wins goodbye (which we would have with Franklin anyway. We saw it last year when we lost Rojas and Allar) in this era of college football.

We can talk about play calls and lack of tackling and such...but at the end of the day this teams going to live and die by its best players being healthy and if you lose them, the season crumbles. If you keep them, I think you're gonna be ok.

Single Tickets go on sale on Oct. 15th.

Palestra Nov. 8th tickets: https://pennathletics.evenue.net/events/PSU

St. Joes Dec. 22 tickets: https://www.ticketmaster.com/penn-state-nittany-lion-basketball-vs-hershey-pennsylvania-12-22-2026/event/0200650CA720C59F?landing=c

We are the Obi-Wan Kenobi of college football.

No one in Star Wars loses more than Obi-Wan. He loses Qui-Gon, Satine, Anakin and the Jedi Order yet somehow he never loses himself.
In most stories, the character arc is about becoming someone new and change, but Obi-Wan has a different story. His story is about remaining who he is even when the world gives him every reason not to. With every loss, Obi-Wan is faced with the choice to either abandon his values or stay true to them. He chooses his duty and values every time.
Staying loyal to our values requires strength, and staying strong can become self-sacrifice. Duty becomes tiresome and isolating while responsibility can become a reason to ignore our pain.
Again sometimes the hardest thing is not changing who you are, but holding onto who you are when the world gives you every reason to let go.

I think Obi-Wan waited about 19 years on Tatooine before striking back against the Galactic Empire. We’re sitting at about 40 years (32 if you count 1994, which I do) so we have Obi-Wan beat but we must remain patient and true to our values, so that we are prepared when a new hope emerges.

/powers down Nittany Blue lightsaber
WE ARE!

Seriously one of the coolest things I’ve seen at a sporting event. I hope they bring that back as well as more obscure anime halftime shows and more Ozzy Osborne on the PA system. We Are!

Why did so many people in here think a drone show at the White Out was a dumb idea a month ago and yet now the majority think it was awesome ??

https://www.reddit.com/r/WeArePennState/s/rKvaHLdS6S

Did anyone get tickets for this game through the university? If so, what section are the tickets allocated for?

Misery loves company!

This is a broader rant about society but the whiteout sucked. The student section may as well have been empty. No one tosses girls in the air x the number of points we scored anymore? No one starts the wave. No cowbell chants at all. We maybe had a low hum on critical 3rd downs as loud as a honey bee.

We set a record of 114,000 attendance and you could’ve been at a high school football game. Everyone. And I mean everyone around me on their phones, scrolling Snapchat, editing selfies at the game. WATCH THE GAME.

I booed the refs and my entire section turned and stared at me bc they were so startled at what was happening and trying to process why I was booing.

The PA announcer SPAMS music every single free moment of your attention span (I’m surprised he’s not advertising Pepsi and Netflix and snapchat+) and it KILLS the opportunity for the crowd to organically hype up.

I unfortunately think the die hard perennials hung up their tailgate keys and this new Penn state product is a vague Kroger version rotation of people who see a game once every 5 years just having their turn at happy valley. It’s completely and utterly disjointed.

Pat Kraft and Sandy Barber are a stain on humanity. The renovations were an utter waste of money. NIL and the transfer portal and coaches robbing rosters has ruined this sport (not just PSU)

There are tons of problems across the board right now and the fanbase has every right to be upset at the coaching staff, Kraft, the stupid decisions along the way.

But I think it’s a bit classless to direct so much of this against a lot of these players especially Rocco who from my understanding is genuinely working his ass off and trying to his absolute best and it’s still failing. Maybe he’s reached his athletic ceiling and that’s fine but this was a transitional year whether anyone wants to admit it or not and he was literally brought onto the team in his final year and as QB1 is the sole face on the field of the mess that’s really spanning across the entire roster (along with his mistakes of course as well)

Just my two cents

.

FYI --- UCLA finished the 2025 season 3-9 before Chesney took over and now he just beat #13 Oregon in their house

Bob Chesney is from a small town 75 miles east of State College and idolized the Nittany Lions growing up --- he said his dream job would be to take over as head coach after JoePa retired

JUST THINK ABOUT WHAT WE PASSED ON --- you asshole, Kraft !!

#18 Penn State moves to 12-4 and 4-2 in conference play.

Last season, a mere glance from Pat Kraft was enough to earn a coach a raise and a contract extension.

This season, he’s performing even greater miracles by making hot-seat coaches look like tactical geniuses overnight.

Who will receive the blessing of Saint Meathead next?

Mike Locksley start lighting your prayer candles...

I’m gonna take a page out of one of my least favorite person on Earth’s book, Aaron Rodgers.

R-E-L-A-X

We are playing Big Ten games with mostly Big 12 talent.

Anyone with eyes and any knowledge of college football can see the talent discrepancy. And despite the talent discrepancy we have lost 2 one score games and admittedly got the doors blown off in Northwestern, but remember that was Northwestern’s Super Bowl, opening of their new stadium, Friday night game. I think most teams lose in that environment that night.

We are ok, remember that Franklin has lost 2 ACC games with mostly Big Ten talent, that is much worse than Big Ten losses with Big 12 talent.

Heard it before. But now I truly realize. We might be the worst most toxic fanbase in all college football haha