Crammed into a small cinderblock room just outside the famed tunnel at Michigan Stadium, Penn State coach Joe Paterno made it clear that after suffering a 27-25 loss on a dramatic and, for Penn State, gut-wrenching last-second touchdown pass, all he wanted to do was go home.

"I just wanna get them on the bus, get to the airport and go home, so we can start thinking about next week," a tired-looking Paterno said while team staffers scurried to load up the bus that would take the dejected Nittany Lions to the Willow Run Airport in Ypsilanti, Mich.

Unfortunately for Paterno, the flight home, much like the game itself, did not go exactly according to plans.

Upon arriving at the airport after the game, the Lions promptly boarded their flight which was supposed to arrive in State College around 9 p.m., but the plane experienced some difficulties and the Lions did not end up landing in Happy Valley until 3 a.m. Sunday morning.

"The airplane had computer troubles. We sat in the plane for three hours and so. They get back that late and stay up, they get a little bit tired," Paterno said. "We didn't do anything [Monday] mostly because of the fact that we had such a tough time getting home."

During the delay, some of the Lions left the plane and re-entered the terminal. Some players slept, some played cards, some watched TV -- anything to get the thought of getting beaten on a last-second touchdown pass out of their heads.

"It was kind of miserable after a tough loss like that with a second left on the clock," safety Chris Harrell said. "We were just sitting on the plane for five and six hours. Guys were just really trying to understand what happened. It kind of made the weekend even more miserable."

Still, as miserable as the situation must have been, it forced the team to confront the loss, allow it to sink in and prepare for the rest of the season.

"When we were going to the airport it was a pretty long silent drive, nobody was talking, guys were still stunned," quarterback Michael Robinson said. "But as we were waiting, guys kind of got out of their little funk and started talking about Illinois and starting talking about, 'OK guys, we still have time to do something special here.' "

Moving past such a devastating loss is hard enough, but trying to do it in an airport in Michigan can either result in a team allowing its frustrations to bubble over and start sniping, or a team coming together and moving on.

Penn State, a team deep in senior leadership, seemingly took the second route.

"Mike Rob and [Alan] Zemaitis, and [Paul Posluszny], they just said, just get over it because we got another game to play, so that's pretty much what we're going to do," defensive tackle Jay Alford said.

"It gave us a chance to sit back and look what happened and kind of be a team," linebacker Dan Connor said. "I don't think it was a bad experience because it brought us back together."

The only other lasting effect of Penn State's unplanned layover was that the team got out of one extra day of practice.

"We didn't practice yesterday because we didn't get into State College -- I didn't get into my house until quarter 'till three in the morning," Paterno said.

Good thing, too, because Posluszny said after going to the mandatory team check-in at 10 a.m., he returned home and crashed for the rest of Sunday -- and then started watching tape for Illinois.