Game Over

by Bill Moushey

  A funereal mood hung over the event. Survivors of sex abuse took the microphone. One said, “These allegations of abuse are horrifying. The people who need our support the most are being overlooked by the entire frenzy.” Sandusky’s accusers, the eight young men who had told their stories to investigators, received recognition in a solemn roll call, identified individually as Victim 1, Victim 2, and so on.

  One speaker at the vigil was LaVar Arrington, a star linebacker on Sandusky’s final team, who had been chosen in 2000 with the second overall pick of the NFL draft by the Washington Redskins. “The biggest crime we can commit is to leave here and forget what happened,” Arrington told the crowd.

  Meanwhile some Penn State alumni set up a fund independent of anything the university was doing. It was designed to raise $500,000 for the victims, roughly a dollar for each of the Penn State alums scattered around the country. The idea started with Jerry and Jaime Needel of Hoboken, New Jersey. Partly out of the shame they felt for what happened and the way some students had reacted on campus, the couple launched a website, proudtobeapennstater.com, with proceeds to be donated to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network. By Friday night more than $200,000 had already been pledged. Said Jerry Needel on the website, “We needed to get our pride back. I felt betrayed, and really disgusted. We want to bring attention back where it belongs, with the victims of abuse.”

  SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 12, DAWNED CLEAR and crisp over a campus that had a cloud hanging over it. Nebraska was in town for the final home game of the season. A bomb squad was called in to do a sweep of Beaver Stadium after a threat had been phoned in, but nothing was found. Nonetheless security was ramped up, and police in riot gear patrolled the outside of the stadium on horseback.

  At the Paterno house at the end of McKee Street, white envelopes overflowed from the mailbox even as a mail carrier approached with a bin overloaded with more messages of support. One letter was different from all the others. It was hand-delivered by Jay Paterno, son of the fired coach and a member of the Penn State coaching staff. Jay told his parents not to open it until he had left for the game. He knew he would be too emotional otherwise. The letter, in part, addressed a son’s love for his father: “You and I through my life haven’t always seen eye-to-eye. But, generally, that’s because I had to grow up to catch up and make eye contact with you.”

  Traffic was bumper-to-bumper coming into State College, just as it always was when Penn State played. In the parking lots, attendants collected $40 for each car and $80 for each recreational vehicle seeking a space. JoePa still had a presence in the form of life-size cutouts set up at tailgate parties. Footballs filled the air and food was served, but some regulars noted a pall that felt like a collective death. Penn State was wrestling for its soul.

  Outside Beaver Stadium fans left flowers and messages at the Paterno statue. Ten students had camped out at Paternoville the night before, each with a letter painted on his bare chest. Instead of hyping the Nittany Lions, the letters spelled out “FOR THE KIDS.” Face-painting was still in vogue, only this time the blue ribbon symbolizing child abuse prevention adorned cheeks. Some fans held up signs that said “JoePa Got Screwed” and “Screw the Media.” One student held up a handmade placard reading, “To the Victims: I Apologize for Penn State.”

  At the Lasch Building, Penn State players donned their football uniforms and boarded the four blue buses for the one-mile ride to Beaver Stadium. The only reserved seat on any of the buses was the front right seat on the first bus. Joe Paterno always sat there, smiling and waving from the window to the crowds lining the streets. On this day, for the first time, that seat was empty.

  Before a home game Penn State players always entered through a tunnel and exploded onto the field. This time they walked out solemnly, arm-in-arm, four at a time, captains in front. Over three hundred former Penn State players were invited to stand on the sidelines for emotional support.

  Prior to kickoff, members of both teams moved to the center of the field to join hands and kneel in prayer during a moment of silence. Penn State’s interim coach Tom Bradley sought out his counterpart, Nebraska’s Bo Pelini, to pray with him. A culture of silence had compounded the issues confronting Penn State, but the silence of 107,000 fans was more deafening than the noise normally generated.

  On the field a prayer was offered by Nebraska’s running back coach Ron Brown, who had been approached by the Penn State chapter of Athletes in Action to say some appropriate words. Brown was a graduate of Brown University, where Paterno had played football six decades earlier. His words weren’t broadcast to the crowd, but the gist of what he said was picked up by TV microphones. Inside the circle of players, Brown walked back and forth like a preacher on the move as he prayed, “Lord, we know that we don’t have control of all the events that took place this week, but we do know that you are bigger than it all. Father, God, there are a lot of little boys around the country today who are watching this game, and they’re trying to figure out what the definition of manhood is all about. I pray that this game would be a training ground of what manhood looks like. That we would compete with fierce intensity, with the honor and gifts and talent that you’ve given us. May the truth be known, may justice be known, may you protect the victims.” Addressing the players, he continued, “Would you say grace and forgiveness for the lives of all of those involved? Now give us a great game, a game that honors you, and in Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.”

  The start of the game restored a sense of normalcy. It had been a week since Sandusky’s arrest, and two weeks since Paterno left the stadium not knowing it was his final game. The Nebraska game was the first played without Paterno on staff since November 19, 1949, when Penn State lost to Pittsburgh 19–0. Today Penn State’s first play was a run up the middle, a subtle tribute to the style of football Paterno had installed at the school when he became the head coach in 1966. In a video shown on the electronic scoreboard during a break in the first quarter, Rodney Erickson, the school’s interim president, said, “This has been one of the saddest weeks in the history of Penn State and my heart goes out to those who have been victimized. I share your anger and sorrow. Although we can’t go back to business as usual, our university must move forward. We are a community.”

  In the second quarter Nebraska jumped to a 17–0 lead as Penn State seemed out of rhythm. But starting midpoint in the third quarter, the Nittany Lions were fighting back. They scored a couple of touchdowns and had two possessions that could have either tied the game or put them ahead. However, it was not to be. Nebraska held on to eke out a 17–14 win. Tom Bradley lost in his coaching debut, but he felt a higher purpose had been served. “I felt today, just maybe, the healing process started to begin,” he said.

  To play the game at all had been a hot topic on campus. There had been strong sentiment to forfeit, in light of the monumental situation unfolding. Penn State’s interim president defended his decision to play the game, saying, “I felt this was a time to play, but also was time we could recognize and bring national focus to the problem of sexual abuse. Our players and everyone involved, the way they conducted themselves today, proved that this was the right decision. This was the way to do it.”

  On the opposing side, Bo Pelini was thankful for more than just a victory. “I’ll be honest with you. Before the game, I didn’t think it should have been played for a lot of different reasons,” he said in his postgame remarks. “I don’t know the specifics of the situation, and I’m not judging anybody. But the fact is, kids were hurt. And that’s a lot bigger than football. . . . I think both teams coming together was the right thing to do and hopefully that in itself made a statement.”

  Joe Paterno’s son Jay, an assistant coach at Penn State for seventeen seasons, usually sat in the coaches’ box high above the field, but was invited to coach against Nebraska from the sidelines. He handled his duties wearing the style of black shoes his father preferred and the jacket his dad had worn during the game in which he broke Bear Bryant’s re
cord for career victories. After the game Jay told reporters, “The world’s kind of turned upside down.” Then he walked to his parents’ house, where his mother always served a postgame dinner to forty or so family members and special guests.

  Before, during, and after the Penn State-Nebraska showdown, Joe’s supporters mingled outside the Paterno home. A cop kept them off the lawn and allowed only family members and guests to approach the front door. Many people left signs or notes for JoePa. Cathy Taylor of Roanoke, Virginia, left this sign: “Despite everything, someone like you deserved to be treated with more dignity and respect than a phone call to your home. And for that, we are sorry. Thanks. Enjoy your retirement. You’ve earned it.”

  In the gloaming, the descending autumn sun created long shadows through the leafless trees in Sunset Park, a public space adjacent to the Paterno home. Sue Paterno emerged from the house and spoke briefly to those who were still lingering on the sidewalk. She told them, “I’ve always felt Penn State was a family. We will be again. We’ll be back. We’re not going anywhere.”

  FALLOUT EXTENDED BEYOND THE PENN State campus. On Sunday, November 13, The Second Mile announced that it had accepted the resignation of John Raykovitz, a practicing psychologist who had run the organization for twenty-eight years. His wife, the organization’s executive vice president, Katherine Genovese, tendered her resignation as well. The Second Mile said it was going to conduct an internal investigation to assess its policies and make recommendations regarding its future. It also said it had hired a new legal firm.

  Meanwhile Governor Corbett made the rounds on the Sunday morning TV news shows. On Fox News Sunday he said that Paterno had met his legal obligation in the Sandusky scandal but didn’t go as far as he should have: “When you don’t follow through, when you don’t continue on to make sure that actions are taken, then I lose confidence in your ability to lead. That would be the case here.”

  Because Penn State receives federal money for research, the U.S. Department of Education entered the case to determine if there had been any violations of the Clery Act, a federal law that mandates reporting of campus crime. The Act was named for a Lehigh University student who had been raped and murdered in 1986. “If it turns out that some people at the school knew of the abuse and did nothing or covered it up, that makes it even worse,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said.

  Among the sports analysts later weighing in on the breaking story was Matt Millen, a former Penn Stater who had played defense under Sandusky and who had been an executive with the Detroit Lions after a career in the National Football League. Now a football analyst on ESPN, Millen said in a voice cracking with emotion, “I get mad. . . . If we can’t protect our kids we, as a society, are pathetic.” Speaking about the events engulfing his alma mater, Millen added, “A horror picture screen writer couldn’t write this bad of a script.”

  On Monday, November 14, during the annual meeting of Catholic bishops in Baltimore, Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York responded to a question about the Penn State scandal by saying, “Whenever this painful issue comes into public view again, as it has sadly recently with Penn State, it reopens a wound in the church. We once again hang our heads in shame as we recall with contrition those who have been suffering. . . . One of the things we learned the hard way, and Lord knows we earned our Ph.D. in the school of hard knocks on this one, is that education in this area is extraordinarily efficacious.”

  The National Football Foundation announced it was withdrawing the award it had been planning to bestow on Tim Curley, its John F. Toner Award, presented annually to the athletic director who has shown “outstanding dedication to college athletics and particularly college football.”

  Pennsylvania’s two U.S. senators, Bob Casey and Pat Toomey, announced that they had rescinded their support of Paterno for the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award. Casey, a Democrat, and Toomey, a Republican, had nominated Paterno for the award in September in a letter to President Obama.

  The Big Ten Conference announced that it was removing Paterno’s name from its championship trophy. In explanation Commissioner Jim Delaney said, “The trophy and its namesake are intended to be celebratory and inspirational, not controversial.” The removal of Paterno’s name brought a sense of sad finality to Marino Parascenzo, a retired sports writer with the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette who had covered Penn State football. “I told my wife that it was like the changing of the dynasties in ancient Egypt,” he said. “The new pharaoh would deface the monuments and erase the names of the old pharaoh, as if to show he never existed. Taking Joe’s name off that trophy was like taking an eraser to his legacy. It was the ultimate disgrace.”

  On the Penn State campus, Mount Nittany stood undisturbed. But the festive culture of Happy Valley and Penn State football had crumbled. Joe Paterno and his Grand Experiment were over. But his legacy and demand for personal excellence, as demonstrated in so many of his players, will remain for generations.

  Chapter 11

  Insularity and Isolation

  Penn State had a way of doing things in isolation. Nobody had to construct a symbolic Great Wall to separate Happy Valley from the outside world; nature built its own version in the form of Mount Nittany. The myth and folklore of Penn State, along with the insular thinking that went into the university’s operations, did the rest.

  Nittany is an Algonquin word that means “single mountain.” The name was given to the geographic formation that sits at the southern end of two ridgelines of the Appalachian Mountains and rises one thousand feet above a verdant valley in central Pennsylvania. Various legends exist to explain how a formation of quartzite, shale, and sandstone become a mountain. In one popular story a young Native American woman named Nitta-nee taught the valley’s inhabitants how to build a barrier against a cruel north wind that had destroyed their crops. After she died of a mysterious illness, the people honored her with a burial mound, which the Great Spirit transformed into Mount Nittany. In another story, a woman named Nit-A-Nee built a burial mound to honor her fallen lover, Lion’s Paw. This mound of dirt and rock magically rose up to become the mountain overlooking the picturesque Nittany Valley. Both stories share a common ending: the mountain formed a barrier against the ill winds of the outside world, and the inhabitants who lived in its shadow would know only happiness. Thus was born Happy Valley. Unspoken was the reality that barriers are meaningless against inside threats. Insularity has the unintended consequence of locking in potential danger.

  Joe Paterno openly embraced insularity, drawing a blue line around his football program. Unlike other big-time college football programs that have media availabilities daily, outsiders, including sports writers, had only limited access to the Penn State football world. Paterno’s practices were closed to the media. He had one media availability a week during football season, conducted by conference call, when reporters were allowed to ask one question each. Interviews with players were arranged through the Sports Information Department. Freshmen were not allowed in front of microphones. On game days the Penn State locker room was closed. Writers could get postgame quotes from Paterno in an interview room inside Beaver Stadium, or take a one-mile bus ride to the Lasch Building to ask questions of players, if they were made available.

  Paterno was unapologetic about sealing off his world, even though it sometimes resulted in reprimands. Two examples of insular thinking occurred at the 2009 Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California, where Penn State lost to the University of Southern California 38–24. Paterno was under contractual obligation to give a pregame sideline interview to ABC-TV, which had exclusive rights to televise the game, but he failed to show up as promised. His excuse was that because he had undergone hip-replacement surgery five weeks earlier, he had to get to his seat in the press box from where he was going to coach the game and was unavailable on the sidelines. He said he didn’t want to put one of his assistant coaches on the spot to give the interview in his place. After the game, sports writers on deadline
discovered that the Penn State locker room was off-limits, a violation of bowl policy. To get quotes for their stories, writers had to depend on a Penn State sports information staffer to bring players out of the room so they could be interviewed in a hallway. The officials who ran the Rose Bowl, which paid $18 million to Penn State for appearing in its televised extravaganza, fined Paterno and Penn State an undisclosed sum for violating its policy of being open to the media.

  Paterno spoke about the fines and explained his closed-door policy to a group of New York City writers prior to a Penn State alumni event on April 30, 2009. The event, called “An Evening with Joe,” was held at the Plaza, just off Central Park in Manhattan. “I have never had an open locker room. If you let the men in, you have to let the women in. I don’t want a whole bunch of women walking around in my locker room. The players take showers, are horsing around,” Paterno told the sports writers. “It’s our game. It’s not your game. I don’t mean that in an adversary [sic] way. It’s our football team. When we lose, we want to cry a little bit or maybe there’s some guy in the corner, griping he didn’t get the ball and all of a sudden someone sticks a microphone in your face.”

  Writers who covered Penn State football said getting information out of State College was like trying to get information out of the Central Intelligence Agency. After the Sandusky scandal broke and Paterno was ignominiously fired, an opinion piece appeared on November 11, 2011, in the Centre Daily Times. It was written by Ron Bracken, a retired sports editor who had spent decades covering Paterno and the Nittany Lions. He compared Paterno’s tightly controlled access to “Kremlin-like secrecy.” “It was understood that if you wanted to be around his program in a professional aspect, you did so at his pleasure and by his rules. And that kind of climate is a Petri dish for what happened in what must now be called the Sandusky Scandal,” Bracken wrote. “It’s pervasive on the campus from the lowest worker in the Office of the Physical Plant to the corner offices in Old Main. It’s all about keeping your mouth shut, doing your job, looking the other way at the various indiscretions and currying favor with those above you in the food chain in order to keep or improve your position.”