Penn State Football Media Day: All About Change
By: Aaron Cheslock
Updated: September 13, 2012
After Bill O'Brien addressed the media for about an hour kicking off Penn State Football's Media Day, players and coaches filled the field at Beaver Stadium taking questions from all sorts of reporters. Then the team went over to the practice field, and the media got to watch practice for a little while. WTAJ talked to players, coaches, really anyone who was at the Penn State facilities, and they all have one common feeling, that change is here.
New Head Coach Bill O'Brien says he's letting his team enjoy themselves.
"We've had a fun camp, we're very positive, we like to laugh, if you're around our staff a lot, there's a lot of chop-busting, it's the same thing with the players, you know the players have respect for us, but it's football..."
For just under a year, there's been nothing fun about Penn State Football, Head Coach Bill O'Brien's trying to change that. He's in the drivers seat now, the football programs biggest change, but that doesn't bother him.
"I don't think about succeeding anyone, I just try to come to work every single day with a great staff, with a great group of kids, and take it day to day, to work extremely hard, but to keep things in perspective."
His players, like Senior DE Jordan Hill, are liking the new scheme's the new coach is bringing in.
"Coach O'Brien, his style of practice is fast paced, and we're doing everything we need to be doing that he wants us to do.
Senior Running Back Michael Zordich agrees.
"It's a new style, it's a new atmosphere you know, he's a younger guy so he's a little more alive at practice. He's got one hell of an offense that he's teaching us, and a lot of ways to go about it... Coach Paterno got in your face he did, but Coach O'Brien, he's joking around, he's
running around with the guys, he's there and he's just getting after it.
O'Brien's coming from the New England Patriots, an offensive juggarnut in the NFL, and while he's not expecting 40-plus points a game from his college offense, He's running this camp, like they do in the pros.
"we do form our practice schedule pretty similar to what we did in New England, but at the end of the day, we can have a fairly long practice during these one-a-days, and still keep guys healthy, there's a lot of individual periods like there is in pro football."
While change does seem to be the theme here all throughout the program, there's one thing that the Nittany Lions don't want to change, and that's the Penn State winning tradition. But we won't find out whether that continues until they kick off against Ohio for the 2012-2013 season.
