Gametime: 12:00 pm

Records: Eastern Illinois: 4-1 (2-1); Penn State: 4-1 (1-1)

Series Record: N/A

TV: ESPN Classic

Audio: Here

Weather: High of 54, 30% chance of rain.

The Lions will wrap up the most unexciting non-conference schedule in the history of college football tomorrow when they take on the vaunted Panthers of Eastern Illinois. What can you say about a game like this?  Actually, not much.  But we'll try anyway...

Week 5 wasn't terrible for Greg, as he posted a 4-4 record and still has hope of finishing with a winning record, as he's currently six games under .500.  Will, on the other hand, had a rough week with a 2-6 mark and drops to 16 games under .500.  He has some work to do if he wants bragging rights after this season.  On the other hand, the winner of this contest is probably going to feel like the winner of the Motor City Bowl.

A couple nice Big11Ten games this week.  Iowa-Michigan will definitely be interesting, as will be Ohio State-Wisconsin. As for the national games, it's all SEC this week.  Confusing line for the Florida matchup as no one knows whether or not Tebow will play.  The guys both like LSU because of it.  As for the rest of the picks, the Buckeyes-Badgers tilt will reveal this week's winner.

As always, we're using Danny Sheridan's odds as our source.

Here's the list for Week 5 (home team in CAPS):

And here's how we're picking:

Here's a look at the standings after four weeks of play:

Will: Last Week 2-6, Overall 15-31

Greg: Last Week 4-4, Overall 20-26

The Nittany Lions are taking on the Eastern Illinois Panthers this week, and in case you haven't figured it out, that makes for a boring week of coverage on the ol' blog.  So we're going to do something a little different tonight.  We've all taken those personality tests on the internet that tell you what character you are from a movie or a sitcom.  Well, instead of giving ourselves personality tests (because we would end up as the nerdy characters that spend their time blogging), we decided to run every team in the Big11Ten through our own test.

Since we love 30 Rock so much, we're going to take a look at how each team matches up with the wild characters from the show.  If you enjoy 30 Rock, we think you'll like this.  If you've never seen the show, get off your ass!  You have one week and one day to catch up and prepare before the season premiere.

Let's take a look at the results...

Penn State got back on the winning track in Week 5 with a beatdown of an awful Illinois squad, but there are tons of other storylines from the world of college football.  So let's take a trip...around the NCAA!

Coming off the loss to Iowa, all anyone wanted to see was Penn State get things back on track to get a win. Illinois would prove to be a good team to straighten things out as the Illini are on a slide much worse than that of Penn State. It was a crappy day weather-wise and things started off incredibly slow, but the Lion's got things together as the game wore on and eventually put up the numbers you would hope to see.

Read more to get onto the recap....

Penn State wasn't the only team to have a rough weekend in Week 4.  The tag team duo of Greg and Will sucked almost as much with their Week 4 picks.  Will picked up a game going 3-5 to Greg's 2-6.  Greg vows to never take Illinois again.  Or at least until they score another touchdown.

Probably the game of the week on the Big11Ten slate this weekend is the Michigan State-Michigan matchup.  Even though MSU is off to a rough start, this still promises to be an interesting game.  And Sparty is favored by 2, despite getting off to a 1-3 start and Michigan being 4-0.  Interesting line.  Apparently you lose some respect if you only beat Indiana by 3 at home.

In the national games, we have a couple interesting matchups.  First, Oklahoma heads to Miami to take on the Hurricanes.  The Sooners have been beating up on cupcakes the last couple weeks, while Miami looks to rebound after a beatdown to Virginia Tech.  And in the other game, we have USC and Cal.  No idea what will happen here, as USC is really struggling on offense, but can Cal bounce back after being absolutely smoked by Oregon last week?

As always, we're using Danny Sheridan's odds as our source.

Here's the list for Week 5 (home team in CAPS):

And here's how we're picking:

Here's a look at the standings after four weeks of play:

Will: Last Week 3-5, Overall 13-25

Greg: Last Week 2-6, Overall 16-22

Blue and White Roundtabe: Week 5

This week the questions come from Kevin at Penn State Clips

Other possible participants:

1) The BCS Championship Game dream is dead, but Penn State can still go to the Rose Bowl (at least in theory). What's your best guess about our final record and bowl destination?

We think there's a pretty fair chance that PSU will still be a one-loss team when they meet Ohio State. If they can beat them and hold of the rest of the Big11Ten, the Rose Bowl is within reach. Last week was a tough loss, but we don't think they're as bad as they appeared.  It took an incredibly bad game from Clark and the o-line for that to happen.

We're generally pretty negative people, but we still think that a Rose Bowl game is within reach, although one of the other New Years Day games are more likely.

2) Illinois beat I-AA Illinois state, but sandwiched it with losses to Mizzou (37-9 in St. Louis) and at Ohio State (30-0). They have, by far, the worst pass offense in the Big Ten and their pass defense stinks as well. They put little pressure on the quarterback (1.3 sacks per game) and they do a lousy job in protecting the passer (3.33 sacks per game). In short, the Illini stink. Who rights the ship on Saturday, PSU or Illinois? Discuss.

PSU. The Illini are in serious trouble and they're not likely to sort it out against PSU. We don't know what's going on with Illinois, but it's not going to help their cause to go up against a very pissed off Penn State team that is actually a lot better than what they put on display last week. Of course, we also expected Illinois to be a lot better, but we've been wrong before. Juice has gone into bad-Juice mode on an almost full-time basis.

The PSU defense is going to do what it can to stop the Illini's 192 yards of rushing per game and force Juice Williams to win the game with his arm.  We hope to see Juice on the ground and a lot of balls sailing into PSU defenders' arms.

And the Illini's weak pass rush may be just what the doctor ordered for an o-line that needs to rebound.  If they can't find their rhythm against a team playing as poorly as the Illini, it should clue us all to what the rest of the season will be like.

3) The Nittany Lions are 2-8 this decade in Big Ten openers and 3-6 in Big Ten road openers. (Obviously there's some overlap there.) The two wins in Big Ten openers were during the championship years of 2005 and 2008. What's the problem?

The problem is that they sucked for half the decade. We don't think it's a problem with starting the conference play specifically, it's just that there have been some pretty bad teams in that stretch and probably would have lost to a lot of teams from any of the BCS conferences. Then during years that PSU had a so-so team, like in 2006 and 2007, they opened against Ohio State and a rebounding Illinois, respectively.

Of course, the answer everyone wants to hear is that it's because of the out of conference schedule. Sure, if it were a little tougher maybe the team would be ready to play a solid Big11Ten team like Iowa. Then the argument can be made that they'll never get a chance to find their game. It really goes either way. Heck, the 2002 team that pounded Nebraska went on to lose to Iowa in the opener. It's pretty much impossible to predict how your out of conference schedule will affect your team, but maybe adding a better team to the mix may help the team learn to play against a good opponent before the Big11Ten schedule starts.

4) Last week's blocked punt for an Iowa touchdown was the turning point in the game. Twice this decade a kickoff return touchdown has been critical in an Illinois victory over Penn State and the way things are going it could happen again Saturday. What's the problem with Penn State's "special" teams? Poor coaching? Lack of a dedicated special teams coach? Not getting our best athletes on the field?

Special teams is often overlooked part of the game, by fans anyway.  Until something goes wrong. In his press conference Joe made sure to let everyone know that he warned the team it would be something like this that could cause them to lose.  He was also quick to say it was not Boone's fault the punt was blocked, something we all should know. Saturday it was something as simple as a missed block, or at least a poorly executed block, that allowed the blocked punt to happen.

Special teams are tough because you generally send out guys who otherwise might not be on the field. The "best athletes" are not out during kick-offs and kick returns, and for a lot of the players these phases of the game may be something new to them. We think it's getting better, with the punt block being an exception.  Even Joe said in his presser that he was pleased with the way coverages have been improving and outside of the punt block, the kicking game has been getting better.

The only thing we think can really help the special teams unit is experience, and it's going to have to come along as the season goes on. It's a big turnover year, so of course every unit is going to be affected.

Quick Hitters...

• The line is Penn State -7. Cover or no? Yeah.
  
• Are you going to the game? Nope.
  
• True or false: Chief Illiniwek was retired as the Illinois mascot after protests by members for the Illiniwek tribe. True.
  
• Will Chicago be awarded the 2016 Olympics on Friday? Negative, Ghost Rider. Madrid.
  

This is admittedly a little late, as our hangover from the Iowa loss continues.  But just because Penn State lost, it doesn't mean there aren't some fine stories out there in the world of college football.  There's still time to check out the fake headlines.  Let's go... Around the NCAA!

After a day of really crappy weather, Penn State fans were treated to an even crappier game.  You usually don't win if you turn the ball over four times, give up a safety and have a punt blocked and returned for a TD.  If there is one word to describe this game, it is 'catastrophe.'

Onto the recap...