No. 6 Penn State looks to rebound, avoid another setback against Washington

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No. 6 Penn State looks to rebound, avoid another setback against Washington

2024-11-08 00:20 Last Updated At：00:30

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) — Penn State players know their goal is still within reach.

The No. 6 Nittany Lions (7-1, 4-1 Big Ten, No. 6 CFP) also realize a College Football Playoff berth could slip away if they let last week’s humbling loss to No. 3 Ohio State snowball.

They’re determined to rebound against Washington (5-4, 3-3 Big Ten) in front of a White Out crowd on Saturday.

“We control our own destiny,” quarterback Drew Allar said. “We have a really good team coming into town that’s playing a lot of good ball right now. So it’s going to be a challenge this week for us offensively and we got to step up to the challenge.”

The Huskies aren’t the Buckeyes, but they still pose a threat.

Washington will bring the nation’s second-ranked pass defense and a little swagger to Beaver Stadium, fresh off a late goal-line stand that helped upend Southern California last week.

While Washington stymied the Trojans from the 1 late in the fourth quarter to help snap a two-game losing skid, Penn State was on the other side of a similar situation.

The Nittany Lions ran four plays inside the Ohio State 3 with just over five minutes to play a week ago. Three runs up the middle went nowhere and a fourth-down pass fell incomplete. Ohio State took possession and ran out the clock.

“We got to do some things better scheme-wise, but also we've got (to) do little bit better job fundamental and technique-wise to make sure we get the movement we need,” Penn State coach James Franklin said.

Allar knows this will be a tough matchup for his wide receivers, but he’s determined to get them going this week.

Since tight end Tyler Warren’s 17-catch game against USC on Oct. 12, Penn State’s top three wideouts have combined for only 12 catches in games against Wisconsin and Ohio State.

Liam Clifford and Omari Evans were held without a catch by the Buckeyes and will now line up against a secondary allowing a Big Ten best 142 passing yards per game. Additionally, the Huskies have picked off eight passes this season, including three last week.

“If not the best, they’re one of the best,” Allar said. “They just stick to guys in coverage. So we’re going to have to make contested catches throughout the whole four quarters this weekend.”

The Nittany Lions need more from their running game.

Nick Singleton and Kaytron Allen combined for four 100-yard rushing performances to start the year. They’ve failed to eclipse that threshold since.

Ohio State’s physical defense held Singleton to a career-worst 15 yards on six carries while Allen managed only 27 yards on 12 carries.

“We got to get our traditional running game going,” Franklin said. “I think that’s going to be a combination of both still doing some of the heavy stuff, but I think we can expand on some of the spread stuff as well to get some guys out of the box to create more space.”

Washington coach Jedd Fisch has experienced a Beaver Stadium White Out — where nearly all of the 107,000-plus fans wear white and virtually glow under the lights.

Sure, it’s a sight, but the noise that comes with it poses the biggest challenge.

Fisch said he spent time earlier this week showing his players clips from Michigan’s 2015 win in Beaver Stadium when Fisch was part of Jim Harbaugh’s staff.

“I know they’ll be loud,” Fisch said. “We’ve just got to go play ball and try to see if we can play the best game we’ve played all year.”

Fisch has had to monitor running back Jonah Coleman’s workload since the junior was unable to finish a game against Rutgers on Sept. 27.

Following the team’s bye three weeks ago, Coleman has looked better and better. He topped out with a career-high 23 carries against the Trojans. He leads the Huskies with 889 yards on 141 carries and seven touchdowns.

“We needed that bye week for Jonah to get back to as healthy as he could be,” Fisch said. “Our goal is about 20 carries. He had 58 (total) plays in the (USC) game, so not just the carries, but in the pass game. That’s a pretty substantial amount of reps for a running back.”

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Montenegro mourns after gunman kills at least 12 people before shooting himself

2025-01-03 03:07 Last Updated At：03:11

CETINJE, Montenegro (AP) — Shock and dismay prevailed in Montenegro on Thursday after a gunman fatally shot 12 people, including two children, in a western town before killing himself.

At least four others were wounded in the shooting rampage in Cetinje on Wednesday that followed a bar brawl, officials said. This was the second such incident in the town in the past three years.

Hundreds gathered on Thursday evening at the main square in Cetinje for a candlelight vigil in the memory of the victims.

Police Commissioner Lazar Šćepanović described Wednesday’s shooting as “one of the biggest tragedies in the history of Montenegro.”

He said at a news conference that the victims included seven men, three women and two children, born in 2011 and 2016.

“Most of the victims were people he knew, his closest friends and relatives,” including the shooter’s sister, Šćepanović said. “This criminal act wasn’t planned or organized. It was unpredictable.”

The shooter, identified as 45-year-old Aco Martinović, killed the owner of the bar, the bar owner's children and his own family members, officials have said.

The attacker, who first fled after the rampage, was later located and surrounded by police. He died after shooting himself in the head, police said.

Residents of Cetinje, a town of some 17,000 people, were stunned and grief-stricken.

"I knew all of these people personally, also the attacker. I think when he did that, he was out of his mind," said Vesko Milošević, a retiree from Cetnje. "What do I know, he went from place to place and killed people. Its a catastrophe.”

Vanja Popović, whose relatives are among the victims, said that “we are all in shock.”

“How can I feel after this?" Popović said. "No one expected it. You can’t even ask anyone anything.”

Police had dispatched a special unit to search for the attacker in the town, which is located about 30 kilometers (18 miles) northwest of Podgorica, the country's capital. All roads in and out of Cetinje were blocked for hours as police swarmed the streets.

Police said that the shooter had died while being taken to a hospital in the capital and succumbed from the “severity of his injuries.”

Officials have said that the attacker was at the bar throughout the day with other guests when the brawl erupted. He then went home, brought back a weapon and opened fire at around 5:30 p.m.

Prosecutor Andrijana Nastić said Thursday that the attacker went to six locations during the shooting rampage, including the last one, where he shot himself.

Four men were killed at the bar, she said. The shooter then moved on to another location where he killed four more people, and then two children at a third site. He then went on to kill two more people at two other locations before eventually shooting himself, Nastić said.

“Further investigation will determine the exact circumstances of the events,” she added.

The government has declared three days of national mourning starting on Thursday, and all planned New Year's festivities have been canceled throughout the country.

Prime Minister Milojko Spajić said that the government may try to impose a total ban on weapons “because we must ask ourselves after this who should be allowed to have guns in Montenegro.”

The small Adriatic Sea nation, which has a population of around 620,000 people, is known for its gun culture and many people traditionally have weapons.

In August 2022 in Cetinje, which is Montenegro’s historic capital, an attacker killed 10 people, including two children, before he was shot and killed by a passerby.

Police have said that the suspect in Wednesday's shooting received a suspended sentence in 2005 for violent behavior and had appealed his latest conviction for illegal weapons possession. Montenegrin media have reported that he was known for erratic and violent behavior.

“Instead of holiday joy ... we have been gripped by sadness over the loss of innocent lives,” Montenegro's President Jakov Milatović said in a post on X.

Associated Press writers Jovana Gec and Dušan Stojanović contributed to this report from Belgrade, Serbia.

No. 6 Penn State looks to rebound, avoid another setback against Washington

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No. 6 Penn State looks to rebound, avoid another setback against Washington

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