The best PSU team in 20 years does it make it great. I am not buying 50 points.
WVU is never a pushover. They also know how their entire state follows their games rapturously and old timers in the state still would see PSU as a secondary rival to them. They’ll bring it in the game. Will it be enough against a program with so much money and willingness to use it? A big difference between programs like WVU and Pitt Vs a PSU and their ilk is the quality ratings of the players across the roster.
Each of us (WVU and Pitt) will have a fair number of pretty good players and even one or two studs. But a PSU will have salaried players from top to bottom of the entire chart. Not just the obvious, starting QB, TB, WR, LB etc, but all of them. That tends to make the unseen difference: each OL, both starter and backup, each DL, each TE, each special teams guy, all of these were highly sought (and paid heartily ) to attend PSU, whereas a WVU or Pitt might have paid for some players, but simply doesn’t have that up and down the roster; our Gibrone Factor will be much higher than PSU’s. So our teams are at a disadvantage there on every single play against a team like PSU. 11 vs 11, there are just many potential vulnerabilities at any given spot. Just one hole in the dike can unleash a flood.
PSU also outspends far more for coaches than both of our programs, likely ten times if not more. Not just for the HC, but for every position coach, every assistant, every uncounted “advisor”, each get paid much much much more than each of our equivalents. Money doesn’t totally assure quality but… it mostly does. At least when playing an opponent of our tier or lower. We can all attest that Duz is a good guy, we have some good to great assistants like Partridge, and given what we spend on players, it overachieves. But by definition our staff ain’t known for its superiority over our opponents. Same for WVU.
Officiating also plays a part. As anyone not blind or retarded knows, refs have largely gotten much worse in general, but especially in college sports, as their integrity has fallen through the sewer. Depending on the conference that provides the refs in this game, there will be degrees of bias. If B12 refs, one might expect it would help WVU. But even within conference officiating, there are differences in allegiance. In the B12, WVU is still a mongrel in a faraway conference to which it has no real belonging. B12 officials likely regularly screw WVU vs “authentic” B12 teams in games within their conference. (This is similar to how ACC refs typically rape Pitt in the rear when playing southern teams in “our” conference). That’s difficult for a typical stone-headed ref to just automatically reverse for a OOC game. Plus, in general, top 10 programs are given gift calls as well because networks want the big programs to be dominant (for ratings). So, expect officiating to go against WVU. Mysterious holding calls and dubious PI (or lack thereof) at critical times. Etc etc.
What can sway things from the inevitable? As often the case, QB play. I know nothing about the QBs of either team, and don’t care to. But if WVU can get a superlative effort from their QB while the PSU QB is merely decent or worse (which often seems the case with them), it can make the difference. I’m gonna guess that won’t happen though.
So something like a 31-21 PSU win is likely.
