When Penn State's offensive circus invades Northwestern, it will encounter a defense that's been whipped. And whipped badly.

The Wildcats acquiesced 773 yards of offense last week in a migraine-inducing 31-point loss and barely squeaked by Northern Illinois and its 539 yards of offense one week before.

"I think Northwestern's defense will probably come out a little bit more fired up this week," quarterback Michael Robinson said.

A fired-up Wildcats defense has had the Nittany Lions pegged the last two years, as coach Joe Paterno was eager to remind everyone on multiple occasions this week.

"We got seven points against them last year," Paterno said. "I think that was the score. 14-7."

To avoid the lackluster performances of the last two meetings, the Nittany Lions game plan will most likely mirror their first three games: a balanced mix of intermittent running plays and the new-found passing.

he play of the offensive line was a giant question mark before the start of the season, but it has shown some twinkles of improvement since.

"This is the second week in a row that we've played with the same group of linemen," Robinson said. "It all starts up front."

Against Cincinnati and Central Michigan, the pass protection was drastically better than the Lions' first game against South Florida. Robinson had plenty of time to throw, plenty of time to find the open receiver and plenty of time to make opposing defenses respect the Lions aerial attack.

The Bearcats and Chippewas were forced to sacrifice a potential run stopper in favor of better pass coverage, which meant that Lions had an easier time running the football too.

"It's become easier to run block because you don't have so many guys down in the blocks," offensive tackle Levi Brown said.

The biggest benefactor of the Lions passing game might be tailback Tony Hunt. His rushing average has perked up to an impressive 7.3 yards per carry, thanks to a few sporadic big plays. Hunt's biggest play of the year was a 70-yard draw play against South Florida, when the Bulls were thinking "pass."

Senior center E.Z. Smith will also return to the field tomorrow, adding more of an established veteran presence to the line.

"We have to see what kind of game shape he's in once he gets in," Robinson said.

Redshirt freshman Deon Butler said the offense was working on more short passing routes in practice this week because the word is out on the Lions' deep passing threats.

"It's pretty difficult now to go deep," Butler said. "They like to give us a lot of short routes because teams might start doing that, so we have to be able to get the short ones and move the chains."

Butler added that as the season progresses, the wideouts have reached a level in practice where the differences between good days and bad days are barely noticeable.

"We might have some bad passes or some drops here and there, but the same day, it's a big play here or a big play there," Butler said. "We're getting more consistent against a top-notch defense like our own."

Luckily for the Lions, the Wildcats defense still has a lot of work to do.