Zack Mills remembers the first time the booing began.

It was Sept. 6, 2003 against Boston College, the third game of the year and the first loss in what would end up being a disastrous season.

He was somewhat lucky, of course, to have already made it through a season and a half as the starting quarterback without enduring any criticism of that sort in Beaver Stadium, but that fact hardly made it easier for the man to deal with.

"When you get booed by people, there's nothing else you can say about it, it's not a fun thing," Mills said. "You're sitting here the lone object on the field with 100,000 people around."

Certainly not a good time, and even more so not the kind of taste he'd like to have left in his mouth when he graduates in December. So now, after reading shirts in the student section ranging from "Got Mills?" to "Bench Mills," there's only one thing that matters to him.

"I really just want to be remembered as a winner," he said.

"I don't want to leave here on a losing team."

Luckily for Mills, he's still got a chance to be remembered how he pleases, simply because it's the nature of college football and its fans to only remember how a player goes out. Come December, and come plenty of Decembers afterward, any dazzling debut or maligned middle likely won't mean a thing.

Kerry Collins, for instance, will stay in Nittany Lions lore as one of the great quarterbacks of all-time, but really only had one season, his final one, that meant anything.

Michigan's John Navarre was criticized as fervently as he was ever praised, but won't be forgotten for pulling it all together his senior season for a Rose Bowl trip.

And that's something Mills always keeps in mind.

"[Navarre's] a guy that had his share of downs and was booed and was often wanted to be replaced, but he had a great senior season and that's all people remember," Mills said. "Fifteen years from now, they're probably not gonna remember his freshman or his sophomore year, they're gonna remember his senior season, what he did for that team, winning the Big Ten."

While the fans have been more than fickle, Penn State coach Joe Paterno has always been one to stay put on the Mills bandwagon, despite opening up the competition for the starting job between Mills and junior Michael Robinson. Paterno, who claims to not have "a real close relationship with Zack because I don't think I need it," is very defensive about Mills' performance over the past few years, even getting angered at a question that indicated his lefty has had his ups and downs.

"I will start off with [saying] I resent the fact that you say he has had his ups and downs," Paterno said. "The team has had its ups and downs. A lot of Zack's problems were not because of Zack.

"A lot of them were the fact that we had very inaccurate people who, when we were throwing the football, we were not quite sure where they were going. They dropped a lot of clutch passes on him. He had to literally coach two freshmen tailbacks in the huddle as to what to do, where to go and so forth. I think Zack did a marvelous job with everything considered."

This year, the tailbacks are older and adamantly maintain they've got the playbook down. The receivers, while still untested, are something that Mills asserts is the biggest difference between this year and last. The tendinitis in his elbow has been gone since spring of 2003, and the MCL is assuredly not still sprained. And, of course, a blank slate of a season awaits.

"If we can get our wideouts to be a little more disciplined, we can catch the ball in the clutch and get a little bit more production out of our tailbacks," Paterno said, "I think you will find that he is really a big league quarterback."

Fortunately for the guy who has aged well past his 22 years, big league quarterbacks are remembered favorably. And they don't often get booed.