Another week, another incident involving one or more Penn State football players.

For those keeping score at home, 46 Penn State players have faced 163 criminal charges since 2002, according to USA Today. And those numbers may rise pending the investigation of Andrew Quarless, Maurice Evans and Abe Koroma.

"Success with Honor"? Maybe not.

For years, Penn State football was viewed as one of the model programs in the country. The players didn't act up; they earned their degrees and grew into upstanding men. Anything less, and coach Paterno would act swiftly and decisively to rectify the problem. He didn't tolerate troublemakers.

Recently though, the legendary coach seems to have been de-clawed a bit, and the players are taking advantage of it. Ten years ago, there would have been no place on the Penn State football team for players that found themselves in legal trouble on more than one occasion.

But some players who have had more than one brush with the law are still on the squad, and cornerback Willie Harriott was dismissed only after a third brush with the law. Even the suspensions seem to be light. Anthony Scirotto missed only one game after instigating an on-campus fight that left students seriously injured in the spring of 2007. Quarless, despite being suspended at the beginning of the week, was allowed to dress for last Saturday's game against Oregon State.

These issues stand out more in national and local media than other programs' mishaps because of Penn State's reputation as a classy program. Had Paterno and the athletic department not set the bar so high for all those years, it's possible that barely anyone would notice the current predicament.

But that's no excuse. The fact is that Penn State is held to a higher standard than the University of Miami or Florida State University and the current crop of players has not met the expectations. Paterno may still take a more hard-line approach than many college football coaches, but he has not remained consistent with the Paterno of old.

The only way to convince players to start acting right is to levy harsher punishments for their infractions and, even more importantly, be consistent from case to case.

"They just want us to go back to the traditional Penn State way of being standup guys," Evan Royster told USA Today. "I think the guys we have now are capable of doing that."

It's a shame for players like Royster that a few bad apples are spoiling the reputation of the group, but it will take a complete effort from everyone, including Paterno, to bring success back with honor.