Penn State's Franklin keeps it positive

The presumption for the last month is that the feeling within the Penn State football program hasn't been very positive, what with the Nittany Lions having lost games before each of their two bye weeks.

If you told that to James Franklin, however, he would say that you are wrong.

With the Lions preparing for Saturday night's game at Beaver Stadium against 13th-ranked Ohio State, Franklin exuded positivity and confidence Tuesday at his weekly news conference as his team tries to bounce back from losses to Northwestern and Michigan that saw it score just one touchdown and 19 total points.

"We're really excited about the opportunity and more optimistic and positive than we've ever been about this program and where we're going," the Penn State coach said. "We have had great interaction with our players this week. . . . I've had some great meetings with our players, and I really see them starting to take ownership of the program and running with it right now.

"I think I have really seen a shift in the last week . . . of guys really understanding what it's going to take to be successful in our system."

Franklin said the plan for Penn State's second bye week was to do less. He felt that the Nittany Lions ran out of gas in the second half of their 18-13 loss at Michigan on Oct. 11, although their defense continued to play well while their offense stalled, and their punting was inconsistent.

"That goes back to kind of learning from our experiences," he said, "to learning about what's going on and the effects of what we're dealing with to make sure that we can get to the game, and we're as fresh and fast and healthy as we possibly can be."

Franklin said he studied numbers during the bye week and learned that "we're somewhere around 46 scholarship players that were actually playing in games . . . . So we're making sure that we're making really good decisions there."

The football program released information last week that said only 52 scholarship athletes were likely to be available for Saturday night's game. The Nittany Lions are allowed 75 scholarships under the final year of restrictions brought about by NCAA sanctions.

Of the remaining 23 scholarship players, 17 are freshmen whom Franklin plans to redshirt, four are out with long-term injuries, and two who left the team are still enrolled in school. Under the sanctions, their scholarships are intact until they graduate or their eligibility expires.

One of the long-term injured - senior guard Miles Dieffenbach, who tore the anterior cruciate ligament in his knee early in spring practice - is reported to be making excellent progress. Franklin indicated he could play some snaps this week.

"To think he's going to go from not playing at all to starting, that's probably not going to happen," he said. "But if you can get him for a series or two, that will be great. We'll see how it plays out."

Recruit injured. The Washington Post reported that defensive tackle Adam McLean, a member of Penn State's recruiting Class of 2015, suffered a season-ending knee injury last week while playing for Quince Orchard (Md.) High School. McLean is a four-star recruit who is ranked as the No. 9 defensive tackle in the country, according to Rivals.