Penn State safety Jaylen Reed is in his own world before he takes the field at Beaver Stadium. He usually listens to music with his headphones on, gearing up for whatever offensive players he’s tasked with handling each week.

But Saturday, the safety decided to take a peak at a score that would impact Penn State. He checked the Ohio State-Michigan game on his phone and saw the Wolverines had won by a field goal — giving the Nittany Lions a chance to play for the Big Ten title with a win over Maryland.

And then, he locked back in and centered his focus on the Terrapins. Because that’s what he — and Penn State — does.

The Nittany Lions took care of business Saturday against Maryland, bullying it with a 44-7 win and reinforcing their identity. Penn State has consistently beaten the teams they should this season, and that’s why they’re heading to Indianapolis to play Oregon for the Big Ten championship.

They stayed focused on the task at hand, finding success all season against inferior opponents like the one they faced in Beaver Stadium on Saturday. Yes, the Terps are a bad team, winning only one Big Ten game all season, but bad teams beat good teams all the time.

“I knew we had to handle business so we can get where we want to go,” Reed said.

And while Reed was aware of the Big Ten championship implications, not everyone was. Several players said they didn’t know they would be going to Indianapolis until after the game was over.

“I saw it up on the jumbotron after the game,” tight end Tyler Warren said.

He wasn’t the only one. Audavion Collins, Dvon J-Thomas, Abdul Carter and Tony Rojas all said they didn’t know until the game ended. If that’s the case, then it’s surely part of why this team has not fallen prey to a team that it should defeat. It’s not looking ahead.

Head coach James Franklin says it almost every week. There are a lot of teams that would love to be in Penn State’s position, winning consistently. Franklin has emphasized his “1-0 mentality” — focusing on the task at hand and not looking ahead — before most of his current players could drive.

This week, Ohio State was one of those teams that could be envious of the Nittany Lions. The Buckeyes just had to knock off hated rival Michigan and they would be the ones taking on Oregon. But then the unthinkable happened and the Wolverines beat Ohio State for the fourth straight year despite coming into the game as three-score underdogs.

It was a surprise that the Wolverines pulled it off, but maybe it shouldn’t have been. Around college football, teams lose to opponents they should beat. Syracuse took down Miami this week. And, last week, Auburn beat Texas A&M, Oklahoma beat Alabama, and Florida beat Ole Miss. Those things happen around the country.

But not at Penn State. And that’s a credit to Franklin, who didn’t even mention the implications of a potential win once he knew Ohio State fell to Michigan.

“We knew, but I didn’t say anything to the team,” Franklin said. “Actually I did the opposite. I said ‘Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland, Maryland.’ Because I think a lot of people were aware of it. Trying to keep us focused. ... You’ve got to control the things that you can control. And the things outside of Beaver Stadium are not in our control. So we needed to win and play well. Lots of eyes watching these games, looking at the statistics, all those things are important. We’re fighting to keep this family together as long as we possibly can.”

It has become cliche for Franklin to cite such a thing, but at this point it’s tough to argue the effectiveness of the focus week in and week out. Just ask the players.

Warren is one of the best players in the country and reacted like you’d expect someone who has bought in to what Franklin is saying — by talking about enjoying this win and then turning the focus on Sunday to an Oregon team that only needed to defeat Washington on Saturday night to stay undefeated.

And that’s a very good thing for Penn State, because this Oregon team is the real test. The kind that the Nittany Lions only had to take once earlier this season when they lost to Ohio State in Beaver Stadium.

It matters, too, that there’s a lot of tangible things on the line in the Big Ten title game. There’s the conference championship itself, but also a first-round bye in the College Football Playoff and even potentially the No. 1 overall seed in the postseason bracket. But there’s more to it than that for this program.

The consistent weekly focus has earned the Nittany Lions the chance to prove this team is different before it even gets to the playoff. It can go to Indianapolis and beat the No. 1 team in the country on a neutral field. And it’s more than capable of doing it.

But for now, it is just this week’s “1-0” for Franklin and his team.