Joe Paterno stood 20 yards behind his defense, but his eyes were glued to the constant rotation of red jerseys under center in Holuba Hall.

Paterno watched quarterbacks Daryll Clark, Pat Devlin and Paul Cianciolo trade an equal number of snaps with the first-team offense during Saturday's football practice. And he insisted at his press conference afterward that he doesn't "necessarily" need to know this spring who the starting quarterback will be.

"They're all good kids," Paterno said. "They all have good arms, they all have a chance to be good quarterbacks. The biggest problem we have is to make sure all three of them get an equal opportunity to show what they can do."

Clark showed off his elusiveness during team drills when he sidestepped a defender and flicked a screen pass that went for about 25 yards. Devlin shined when he threw deep during seven-on-seven; on one play, his tight spiral arced over a defender and fell perfectly into wideout Deon Butler's hands.

Senior receiver Jordan Norwood, who led the team with five touchdown catches last season, said he wouldn't mind playing in a two-quarterback system that featured both Clark and Devlin.

"A lot of healthy competition," Norwood said. "That's what it takes, whether it's a two-quarterback system or not, that competition -- inner-team competition -- will push the other guy forward, push each other forward to make us a better team."

Clark, Devlin and Cianciolo were not made available to the media following practice.

All three quarterbacks slapped high-fives with teammates as they left Holuba and during practice, while one worked with the first team, the other two pointed at the defense and huddled close to offensive coaches.

Paterno said he will continue to assess the quarterback situation throughout the spring, but didn't give a timeline on when the team would anoint its starter.

"You may have noticed one series, Clark's with one group, the next series, Devlin's with that group," Paterno said. "When we go out [today], maybe Clark will be with one group and Cianciolo will be with that group and we'll switch those around just to get a feel.

"That's one of the benefits, one of the good things about spring practice. And when you only have three, it's easy to kind of give them all a good shot."

Derrick Williams ran route after route and caught ball after ball -- each one from a different quarterback during drills.

The senior wideout, who led Penn State with 55 catches last season, hinted the starting spot is either Clark's or Devlin's to lose, but said because he's been working with both signal callers since the winter, he's gained confidence in both of them.

"Both of them are very smart kids and they're doing a great job right now, they're way ahead," Williams said. "Both of them are agile, both of them can throw, it's just which one of them is going to pick it up the fastest?"