2019 vs. Pitt—The Evacuation of Beaver Stadium

Sept. 14, 2019 had clouds and light rain in the Happy Valley forecast for the scheduled noon kick, and most folks arrived at Beaver Stadium with their rain gear for the 100th meeting with the Pitt Panthers… It would also possibly be the last ever meeting of the two… No further games were scheduled, at the time, for the series that began in State College in 1893 and had at times, determined the best in the East and the best in college football…

108-thousand fans were expected for the game, but the stadium was slow to fill which was typical for an early start and also might have been a lucky break… By about 11am the clouds in the distance had taken on a more ominous look, and at 11:08, the stadium video screens above the two endzones posted a National Weather Service warning of a lightning storm nearby... The evacuation would begin shortly… By about 11:30am, the fans inside the stadium had moved from their seats and taken cover wherever possible underneath a virtually all-metal structure… Fans who had yet to enter the stadium were told to return to their cars or wherever they could find cover away from the stadium… Team and field personnel returned to their respective locker rooms as the kickoff would be delayed past noon…

Some flashes of lightning could be seen in the distance, however only rain arrived at the stadium… A few minutes after noon, most folks had returned to their seats and the gates re-opened for the now 12:40pm kickoff… While the clouds continued, the sun popped out here and there…

The game itself was memorable for being a nail-biter to the finish… Pitt wasn’t about to bade farewell to Penn State without taking a piece of the 13th ranked Nittany Lions with them… Quarterback Sean Clifford would be pressured all day and sacked three times while completing under 50% of his passes… Fortunately, PSU’s running game was doing enough to keep the Lions above water…. Journey Brown rushed for 109 yards while Devyn Ford and Noah Cain each reached the endzone… It was Cain’s 13-yard TD dash in the 3rd quarter that put State in front to stay, 17-10…

If there was any lightning at Beaver Stadium that afternoon, it struck Pitt at a bad moment in the fourth quarter… With under 4 minutes to go, the Panthers have a first and goal at the PSU one yard line… And they can’t get in… The Lions make a stand… Pitt QB Kenny Pickett is stymied passing and running on 3 plays… Then on 4th down, Panthers coach Pat Narduzzi has a “head scratching” moment… Down 7 late, he opts for the field goal… He will later tell the media that they needed two scores to win, but frankly, he needed more than 3 to tie… Cue the Lightning strike… Pitt’s Alex Kessman will attempt a 19-yard field goal… Folks who were there that day can still hear the “clank” as the ball struck the left upright… The kick was no good… Pickett will still give the Panthers one last chance leading them to the Penn State 26-yard line… But his final pass is broken up by Linebacker Cam Brown… Prior to that final pass, time was added back onto the game clock by the refs with no in-stadium announcements leaving fans confused and wondering if the game had ended—initially, it was :06 and then :09, but it was not a factor as the incomplete pass by Pickett ended the game once and for all… Penn State escapes the so-called series finale, 17-10… The Nittany Lions hold sway in the 100 games with a record of 53-43-4 vs. Pitt…

NOTE: The PSU-Pitt series actually had two games scheduled at points which were never played…

The Nov. 21, 1898 game was cancelled by Penn State because (according to newspaper reports at the time) the State faculty thought it was inappropriate for the team to play on the Monday before Thanksgiving… While this seems odd considering that State and Pitt would play many times on Thanksgiving Day & Thanksgiving Friday through the years, the cancellation might have been driven by the fact that the Penn State’s football team also had road games scheduled on the Saturday before Thanksgiving (Washington & Jefferson near Pittsburgh) and the Saturday after Thanksgiving (Dickinson at Williamsport)… It was common in this era to double-up road games to manage travel costs, but students could only miss one class day for travel per season in the 1890’s…

There was at one point in the 1942 season a second game scheduled with Pitt on November 28th at Pitt Stadium just one week after the November 21st game at Penn State… The game on the 21st was played and it was a 14-6 Lions win… The game on the 28th never happened… Early season game programs indicated the second Pitt game would be a fundraiser for “Army Relief” as the country was at the height of World War II… The date became available when military teams cancelled games with both State and Pitt… But game two simply disappeared at some point that fall… The Daily Collegian made no mention of it in coverage of the first Pitt game at State College… And programs for Penn State games in the two weeks leading up to the game on the 28th either didn’t mention it or showed the original game with Camp Lee that had long since been cancelled…

For Other Tales of Bad Weather Games—CLICK HERE

1992 at Notre Dame… Snow Bowl One (aka The Rudy Game)

1921 at Harvard… The Game in the Gloaming

2013 vs. Kent State… I don’t think we’re dressed for this!