This year's Penn State football team is so different from every Nittany Lions squad of the past -- everybody's saying it, so it has to be true.

Except Kirk Ferentz. In fact, the Penn State team the Iowa coach has viewed on tape looks a lot like the teams he remembers from the Lions' glory days. As in dominant.

"To me, they look like the kind of Penn State I saw growing up," said Ferentz, who attended Upper Saint Clair H. S. in Pittsburgh. "They've always got good skill players, always have, always will. It's a typical Penn State team."

In Ferentz's mind, the winning part of Penn State's history is bigger than the smashmouth signature. Instead of harping on offensive changes, like instituting shotgun and option packages, Ferentz focused his analysis of the Lions on the maturation the team as a whole, especially at key positions.

"They look like a strong football team," Ferentz said. "They look like they have a veteran offensive line and they have confidence in their quarterback, Zack Mills. He came in against us last year and he's developed into a good leader for them."

Ferentz also goes against the conventional wisdom when it comes to the coaching strategies of Penn State coach Joe Paterno. Whereas most people have said the legendary coach is having some epiphany about how the modern game is played, Ferentz contends Paterno is simply doing what made him the winningest coach in Div. I history.

Ferentz compared Paterno to Alabama coach Bear Bryant, who held the record prior to Paterno and also made unusual adaptations like running wishbone and single-wing sets.

"That's what great coaches do," Ferentz said. "They work with the players they have and build confidence."

What worries the Hawkeyes coach is not the array of new plays but rather how well his team matches up against Penn State's running game. In its first four games, Iowa faced teams that spread the ball offensively using multiple formations, much like the Lions' last opponent, Louisiana Tech.

Meanwhile, in Larry Johnson, Penn State has a tailback capable of gobbling up yards, as he's proven this season with his 6.7 yard-per-carry average.

"I'm not sure if we can stop the run yet," Ferentz said. "If Penn State throws 57 formations at us, we can handle that but I don't know if we can stop the run."

The one thing Iowa seems to have going in its favor is momentum, as the Hawkeyes have defeated Penn State the last two years. However, Iowa lost team leaders quarterback Kyle McCann and tailback Ladell Betts, and Ferentz contends both squads are vastly different than the ones that met at Kinnick Stadium.

"First of all that's in the past," Ferentz said. "This is a whole different Penn State team we're playing. They have confidence, you don't man-handle a Penn State team like this."