How a confident Drew Allar just set the tone for Penn State football’s entire 2024 season

The clock in Milan Puskar Stadium slowly wound down to zero Saturday without much drama.

The Penn State players and coaching staff walked onto the field as the final seconds ticked off of their 34-12 win with very little celebration. The Nittany Lions kept it all business, shook their opponents’ hands and walked to their awaiting fans in the corner of the field to sing the school’s alma mater, with the occasional celebratory hug interrupting their paths.

That was in stark contrast to how their quarterback handled the four quarters that preceded the departure from the field: Junior quarterback Drew Allar confidently and enthusiastically picked apart the West Virginia defense, setting the tone for what’s to come this season for Penn State.

Allar was a different player than the one the country last saw in the Peach Bowl when he completed fewer than 50% of his passes in the team’s 38-25 loss to Ole Miss. This iteration never seemed to lose confidence or go away from what he was trying to accomplish. Always pressing forward, always believing.

That was apparent almost immediately, when he yelled at the referees after a simulated first-quarter snap count by the defense caused a fumble.

“Obviously I have to tell the ref that; I can’t let that slide because that’s going to be a disadvantage for us all day,” Allar said of the exchange. “Honestly, I probably should’ve kept my cool a little more in that moment.”

And you could see it in the way he emphatically signaled with his arm when he ran for a first down — several times. Or how he boldly launched deep passes to his receivers when those opportunities presented themselves. Or how he stiff-armed a defender to the ground and sharply rose to his feet when the play ended as if he had something to say to his opponent.

Allar said that’s always been a part of his game — and that his parents would vouch for that — but quarterbacks coach Danny O’Brien helped bring that out.

“With Danny, he talks about just being me and playing loose and free and confident and how I want to play,” Allar said. “I think there’s situations where that’s OK to happen with and just showing the guys I have emotion and that fire like everybody else. It’s something that I’m always working on.”

Allar didn’t necessarily hide from those moments last season, his first as a starter, but wasn’t as vocal. His enthusiasm Saturday didn’t go unnoticed by teammates, either.

“He’s starting to create, trying to create more explosive plays in another part of his game without his arm,” safety Jaylen Reed said. “Everybody thinks he just can throw, throw, throw, and you’ve seen today, he made plays with his feet.

“And I’m happy for him. It’s great. That’s championship-team (level) right there. When your quarterback got swag like that, it’s crazy. I’m telling you, that’s like — a lot of teams win championships like that. When your quarterback is the leader, that means everything.”

And unlike last year, the offense never seemed to stray from its path. The unit was given multiple opportunities to slip up and regress to what it was last year when it, and Allar, struggled against good opponents. There was the slow start, the simulated snap-count issue and of course the 139-minute delay for lightning that kept the team in the locker room — or just outside it — during halftime.

Players watched film, stretched, ate and like everyone else, waited for the storm to subside. And when it did the offense came out strong again, with Allar making a couple of those big runs to pick up first downs before Nick Singleton darted through an open hole for a 40-yard touchdown.

That was what happened for most of the game. Allar showed enthusiasm and poise in the moments that called for them, reinforcing why he was a five-star quarterback when he arrived on campus in 2022. This version of Allar, like the 2023 one compared to the 2022 one before it, is very different.

Some critics had already painted him as a bust. He couldn’t handle big games emotionally. He was the reason the team couldn’t — and wouldn’t — get over the hump. The 20-year-old was a finished product who would never live up to the expectations set for him before he’d ever started a game.

But Saturday may have been a shift in the other direction. The noise was a little quieter, the social media posts a little more positive. The narrative appears to be slowly but surely shifting from a negative one to a positive one.

Some have already begun with the hyperbole. Gus Johnson, who was doing play-by-play of the game for Fox, compared him to Tom Brady. And surely there will be more comparisons if Allar continues to make positive impressions like he did with his 216 yards and three touchdowns on 11-of-17 passing against West Virginia.

For now, though, it’s only a beginning. A start to a season that could change Allar’s — and Penn State’s — future.