John Walters

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Penn State safety Mark Rubin jabbed the ball out of Terrelle Pryor’s grasp, and in so doing may have just sucker-punched the national title hopes of the Big 12 or SEC champion.

The Nittany Lions are 9-0 following a hard-fought, old-school 13-6 victory at Ohio State on Saturday night. It was a contest in which Woody Hayes would have basked, a 3-yards-and-a-cloud-of vulcanized-rubber (this is the FieldTurf era, after all) classic in which the victorious team committed neither a turnover nor a penalty. Where the game’s only touchdown drive was engineered by a backup quarterback who had just entered the game — in the fourth quarter — and who led Penn State to paydirt without officially throwing a pass.

How old-fashioned was it? The Buckeyes welcomed back their 1929 homecoming queen in pre-game festivities, and she recognized every formation. And, no, she never dated Penn State head coach Joe Paterno.

On a day, however, when Texas quarterback Colt McCoy completed a school-record 18 consecutive passes against Oklahoma State … when Texas Tech scored touchdowns on its first eight possessions in a 63-21 victory at Kansas … when Oklahoma posted 55 points in the first half at Kansas State … when Tim Tebow and Florida manhandled a decent Kentucky team 63-5 … on such a sexy Saturday for college football’s elite, what retort might the 81-year-old Paterno give to the cognoscenti who say that this Big Ten skirmish was, in comparison, dreary?

“They’re probably right,” Paterno, his cane resting in his left hand, said afterward. “But I can’t do anything about it. What do I care what they say? That was a good football game. And I’ve seen a lot of football.”

Oh, he’s seen a lot of college football. Saturday’s game was the 506th Penn State game Paterno has witnessed as the school’s head coach (he missed three others in his 43 seasons due to personal matters). Those do not include the 156 he viewed as a Nittany Lions assistant from 1950-1965. Nor should you forget the two dozen or so contests in which Paterno played at Brown (he still holds that Ivy League school’s interceptions record). Has anyone seen more college football without paying for a ticket — or tailgating — than Paterno? Probably not.

And so, if the all-time wins leader (381 and counting) says that it was “a good football game,” who are we to disagree? Sure, the production assistant cutting the highlight reel back in Bristol, Conn., might have stifled a yawn or two. Through three quarters, neither offense produced a touchdown. The Buckeyes, who entered the game 7-1 and 10th in the AP poll, never produced a rushing play of longer than 9 yards. And in front of an Ohio Stadium record-crowd of 105,711, the two YouTube-worthy catches were made by a pair of backup wideouts named Salzenbacher (Ohio State) and Zug (Penn State).

Somewhere, Mike Leach is hurling.

Still, it was dramatic. Rubin, a 6-foot-3 senior heretofore best-known for having beaten Michael Phelps a few times in the pool back in their junior high days, caused the fumble that incited the madcap scramble (think Indiana Jones in every Asian bar he ever visited) that resulted in Penn State getting the one break both teams craved.

The turnover at midfield resulted in a 12-yard net gain for Penn State, its fifth-longest gain of the night. Seven plays later — six of them rushes, the seventh a pass interference call — Nittany Lions backup quarterback Pat Devlin scored the game-winning touchdown. It was most fitting, considering the manner in which this struggle was combated, that Devlin scored from 1 yard out on a quarterback sneak.

And so Penn State heads into its bye week 9-0 and poised to move somewhere north of third place in the BCS standings if and when unbeaten Texas (Big 12) or unbeaten Alabama (SEC) topple. The Nittany Lions have a road game at Iowa followed by home contests versus Indiana and Michigan State. The Hawkeyes could pose problems and the Spartans are much improved, but the white helmet-black shoes crew will be favored in all three games.

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That is where the squirming begins. If No. 1 Texas, which plays its fourth consecutive top-11 opponent in Texas Tech next Saturday night in Lubbock, emerges unscathed after its dozen games, there is a grassroots movement afoot to waive the Big 12 championship game for the Longhorns. The point is, an undefeated Texas squad will have answered every question as to its title-game worthiness.

So, too, would Alabama. Should the Tide finish 13-0, they will have defeated LSU in Baton Rouge, Georgia in Athens and either Florida or the Bulldogs yet again in Atlanta. No amount of sentimentality toward Paterno will overcome that 2008 resume.

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The problems begin should either one of those schools lose. The volume of the cries will be loudest from Gainesville (Florida) or Athens (Georgia) in the SEC, or Norman (Oklahoma) or Stillwater (Oklahoma State) from the Big 12. That is assuming that one of those four one-loss teams wins out the rest of the way.

And what happens if Texas Tech, currently seventh in the BCS standings, takes down No. 1 Texas next Saturday? Do they leapfrog a bye-week No. 3 Penn State? Have you ever seen a Happy Valley turn instantly into Irate Valley?

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Of course, that is the fun (some would say madness … others, idiocy) of college football, where every succeeding weekend matters more than the previous one. And where conjecture more often than not sorts itself out by the time the first advent candle is lit.

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