All in all, it was a day to remember for Noah Herron.
The Northwestern tailback rushed for 175 yards and a touchdown against a stingy Penn State defense and broke the 1,000-yard barrier for the season.
Too bad he only remembers half of it.
A big hit near the goal line on the Wildcats' first touchdown drive saw to that.
"It was about the middle of the second quarter and I was just sitting there -- I guess I was sitting there -- and I was just like, 'Oh, what happened to the game?' " Herron said.
Here's the part Herron does remember. A brutal 13-play, 83-yard drive that he capped off with a 1-yard touchdown plunge that held up for the winning score. On that drive alone, Herron had eight carries for 43 yards.
The surprisingly potent Wildcats offense wore out the Lions' front seven in the second half, finding a formula that worked to perfection and sticking with it: operating out of their standard shotgun spread formation with four wide receivers and just Herron in the backfield.
The formation forced the Lions to spread out as well, and go primarily to a zone defense, giving the Wildcats room to run up the middle and find receivers between the hashes as well on key third downs.
"Whenever they thought we were gonna be in some kind of zone defense, they were gonna find the crosses going around," Penn State cornerback Alan Zemaitis said. "So there's a guy, whatever guy, that goes across the zone, if he exits that zone, he throws into another player's zone and they were finding that pocket in between the players."
But the key was Herron. The senior tailback brought back painful memories of last season's run defense, having his way with a unit that was unable to get off the field in the second half.
The Wildcats gave the most credit to their massive offensive line, anchored by 6-foot-7 Zach Strief, which opened holes for the 230-pound Herron to bowl through and drag tacklers with him.
The most memorable came on the game-changing touchdown drive in the second half when he dragged Lions corner Anwar Phillips for 8 yards before being knocked down by Zemaitis.
"We latched onto something that was going pretty well for us," Northwestern coach Randy Walker said. "One of our philosophies is, if it's not broke don't fix it, if we got something going, keep feeding it. I call it cramming the ball in there. There was not a lot there and I thought Noah crammed it pretty effectively."
Herron's impressive day was almost derailed at the start. On first-and-goal from the Penn State 8-yard line in the first quarter, Herron came off left tackle and broke for the corner of the end zone. Near the sideline, however, he was met by Phillips and linebacker Dan Connor and looked to go limp as he hit the ground.
Play stopped for several minutes as trainers attended to Herron and rose him to his feet in a clear daze. As it was though, Herron would miss only the next two drives and return in the second quarter to finish the half with 62 yards rushing.
"I didn't know what the prognosis would be," Walker said. "Obviously he came out of it quickly and thank God he did. I'm awful proud of him and the job he did, but again, talk about courageous, he's the one I'm talking about."
