Pleasant plane rides home -- this team hasn't had many of those.

So after Penn State defeated Indiana, at Indiana, last Saturday, the players were relishing the luxury of finally getting to joke around and chat casually on the team plane, rather than lament over mistakes, as they typically do. Unfortunately for them, however, there was a disturbing interruption -- the score of the Michigan State-Wisconsin game.

"A couple of guys got updates from their friends on their cell phones, and at first I thought they were joking," senior linebacker Derek Wake said. "They said -- I don't remember the final score -- it was like 49-10 or something."

The score was, in fact, 49-14, meaning that the Spartans were the first team all season to score prolifically on Wisconsin's stingy defense. In fact, the Badgers had held every team on their schedule to 17 points or less, meaning that the Spartans outscored any other opponent by a whopping 32 points.

"That's our luck," defensive tackle Scott Paxson said, "with Michigan State being on top of their game when they come into to town to play us."

Interestingly, before the MSU-Wisconsin game, Penn State was in the company of both Wisconsin and Auburn as the only teams in the nation whose defenses had not allowed more than 21 points. So despite any confidence the Nittany Lions have after their heroic goal-line stand last Saturday, that has to be called into question, just a little bit, based on what the Spartans achieved as of late.

"Wisconsin was one of the best defenses in the country, supposedly, and Michigan State put 40 points on them," Wake said. "So every week, it's a new surprise and challenge."

The thing about Michigan State's offense is that it's extremely hard to defend, as evidenced by the fact that they lead the conference in yards of total offense. They have a very healthy ground game, as they average 243 yards a game, good for second in the Big Ten. And they also have a pass attack -- though sophomore quarterback Drew Stanton was previously sidelined with a separated shoulder, he will play tomorrow.

In short, the deal about the Spartans is that they run, they pass, they change things up -- and the Penn State players say they're the kings of misdirection.

"They run a lot of everything, that's why it's so hard to defend," Paxson said. "All different formations, they spread it out, run the ball. We'll watch film and try to pick up tendencies, so we can maybe read something before it happens."

Though this Penn State defense has been so fabulous all year and is fired up to accomplish its one outstanding goal of the season -- holding an opponent scoreless -- it didn't exactly pick the ideal team against which to accomplish that mission.

Keeping the Spartans to fewer than 21 points -- the exact task in which the hyped-up Badgers defense failed last week -- would be enough of an accomplishment in itself.

"These guys have proven they are one of the best because they just dismantled Wisconsin," senior safety Andrew Guman said. "They picked them apart and made it look rather easy."