I don’t know why I keep going back to football. It has made me so sad this weekend with the way it has given hope to my teams and then snatched it away. I should be thinking about the fun times I had with my family on Saturday and Sunday, but instead I’m dwelling on Penn State losing to Iowa after taking an 11-point lead in the third quarter and the New York Giants losing to Denver after taking a 19-point lead into the fourth quarter. I don’t know why I expect my teams to come through. They keep fooling me again and again before pulling the rug out from under me and leaving me in pain.
The Penn State loss doesn’t even seem that bad anymore when compared to the Giants, but it would have been really cool to win in a tough road environment during Terry Smith’s first game as interim head coach and Ethan Grunkemeyer’s first game as starting quarterback. That would have been a huge lift for the program, but once again Jim Knowles’ defense failed to contain a scrambling quarterback.
RUN MARK RUN 😏@mgronowski11 x #Hawkeyes
pic.twitter.com/4xpwzXTb38— Hawkeye Football (@HawkeyeFootball) October 19, 2025
Penn State’s offense could have done more in this game. It could have converted a goal-to-go situation into a touchdown with five minutes to play in the fourth quarter and went up by nine points instead of settling for a field goal and a five-point lead. Given the inexperienced quarterback and a tough Iowa defense, though, I was happy with how the offense played. Kaytron Allen grinded out 145 yards and two touchdowns on 28 carries while keeping Grunkemeyer out of third and long for most of the night. The defense had to step up and keep Iowa out of the end zone with five minutes left, but instead it allowed Hawkeyes quarterback Mark Gronowski to take off on a 67-yard run. Kaden Wetjen scored on a jet sweep for the go-ahead touchdown on the next play.
The tackling on that play was atrocious with Zakee Wheatley and Elliot Washington II both whiffing on Gronowski at the same time instead of stopping him for a seven-yard gain. I don’t know if you can blame Knowles for that, but something is wrong with this defense and the way it allows the opponent to score a touchdown in every key spot during this four-game losing streak. Against Oregon, Penn State led by a touchdown in overtime and the Ducks faced 2nd and 13 after a botched handoff. They scored two touchdowns in a row before sealing the game with an interception.
In the UCLA game, there were many opportunities to stop the Bruins’ momentum and get the ball back in Drew Allar’s hands, but the defense allowed Nico Iamaleava to convert third down after third down with his scrambling. Finally it looked like Penn State would stop the bleeding at home vs. Northwestern, but the defense allowed the Wildcats to answer the Lions’ 91-yard touchdown drive in the fourth quarter with a 75-yard drive of their own to win the game.
Kick 6️⃣@XavierGilliam_ @E_WashingtonII #WeAre | LIVE on @Peacock
— Penn State Football (@PennStateFball) October 19, 2025
The defense made some plays at Iowa, like Wheatley’s interception on Iowa’s first drive that led to Penn State taking the lead. There was also the blocked field goal and touchdown return at the end of the first half that put Penn State ahead before halftime. It really looked like the Lions might come away with an emotional win when Allen finished their 75-yard drive at the start of the third quarter with an eight-yard touchdown run, but that 21-10 lead slowly evaporated due to mistakes on both sides of the ball.
Penn State now has a bye week before playing the top two teams in the country, so there’s a good chance we see the losing streak reach six games before the Lions sniff a conference win. On the other hand, it would be hilarious to upset Ohio State right after firing James Franklin.
This stretch of Penn State football would be easier to manage if the Giants weren’t also posting heartbreaking losses, but after giving the fan base hope with an upset win over Philadelphia 10 days ago, the familiar pain and misery returned in a historic collapse at Denver.
NFL teams had won 1,602 consecutive games when leading by 18+ points with six minutes or less to play in the fourth quarter until the Giants' loss to the Broncos today
(h/t Kevin Harlan/CBS) pic.twitter.com/bx03Gklp7j
— Giants Videos (@SNYGiants) October 19, 2025
It sure looked like the Giants had the game in hand when Tyrone Tracy Jr. scored on a 31-yard touchdown run to make the score 19-0 late in the third quarter. It looked that way some more when the Giants answered Denver’s first score of the game with Theo Johnson catching a 3rd and 17 throw that bounced off of Wan’Dale Robinson and taking it 41 yards to the end zone. You don’t get a huge break like that to take an 18-point lead with 10 minutes to play and lose the game. Unless you’re the New York Football Giants.
Bo Nix led Denver on a 74-yard touchdown drive to cut the deficit to 10 with five minutes left. It’s really hard to score twice in five minutes, so it was smart of the Giants to run the ball twice on the ensuing possession to make the Broncos use two of their three timeouts. It was on third down where the Giants made a major error.
Justin Strnad's interception was a game-changer for the @Broncos 🔥 pic.twitter.com/MpdHfBEqCX
— NFL (@NFL) October 20, 2025
I’m okay with throwing the ball there. I know there was a two-score lead and that the Giants could have ran Denver out of timeouts, but I am a big believer in moving the chains to run out the clock instead of just running the ball. The problem was Jaxson Dart making his worst throw of the game at the worst possible time. If the Giants convert the third down, they can run more clock and punt and the game is probably over. If the Giants run for three yards and a cloud of dust, Denver uses its last timeout and has to score very quickly to avoid the necessity of an onside kick. If Dart throws an incomplete pass instead of an interception, Denver still has to score quickly, but it has slightly more margin for error because of the timeout. I think taking the risk of going for the first down is worth it.
The problem is that the interception allowed the Broncos to score in less than a minute, but the Giants still had a chance to run out the clock with a first down. Instead, Dart overthrew Robinson after two Cam Skattebo runs for a total of two yards. Denver got the ball back with more than enough time to line up a game-tying field goal, and it turned out to be more than enough time to score a go-ahead touchdown. The Broncos did just that after Nix hooked up with Marvin Mims for 31 yards on 3rd and 11. The sophomore quarterback then found former Giants tight end Evan Engram for another 20-yard chunk before scrambling 18 yards into the end zone with 1:51 on the clock.
Somehow, the game was still far from over. Dart pulled a rabbit out of the hat when he connected with Robinson for 20 yards on 4th and 19. The addition of a roughing-the-passer penalty put New York 40 yards away from paydirt, but that may have been a curse in disguise with the way this game turned out. A 39-yard pass interference flag on a pass intended for Beaux Collins moved the Giants within a yard of the go-ahead score, and they got that score on a keeper by Dart that was initially ruled short of the goal line.
It turns out that the Giants needed Dart to be short of the goal line so that they could run more time off of the clock and escape with a victory, because 37 seconds was still plenty of time for Nix to set up a game-winning field goal. And game-winning it was because Jude McAtamney missed his second extra point of the game after Dart’s run was ruled a touchdown. This guy is kicking the NFL after going 12 for 19 on field goals during his career at Rutgers, including just four makes out of seven attempts on kicks between 30 and 39 yards. Younghoe Koo only made 74 percent of his field goals last year, but he was perfect on extra points, and more importantly has been kicking professionally since 2017. Why is he on the practice squad and McAtamney dressing for games?
Maybe the Giants lose this game in overtime (I’m actually sure of it), but it would have been nice to find out even though in the moment I just wanted to be put out of my misery. The final fail of the game was New York defensive coordinator Shane Bowen setting up the same three-man-rush prevent defense that allowed the Cowboys to set up their game-tying field goal in the final seconds of the Week 2 game in Dallas. How has Bowen not learned anything since then?! The soft coverage and zero pass rush allowed Nix to find Marvin Mims on the Giants’ 48-yard line. I’m fully confident that Wil Lutz would have crushed a 65-yard kick from there to finish the Giants, but just in case Nix hit Courtland Sutton down the sideline for 22 more yards. Lutz calmly hit the 39-yard field goal to end the game.
It will be tough to find a more brutal loss than that. The defense was great for three quarters and then gave up four touchdown drives in a row plus the game-winning field goal drive. Jaxson Dart was poised a precise until his interception helped give the game away. The Giants were rolling towards another win that looked like it would give the team a shot at the playoffs in 2025, but instead we are looking ahead to 2026. Maybe we’ll get sucked into believing again a week from now in Philadelphia, or maybe the Eagles will offer a harsh dose of reality. I’m sure either way it will be torture.
| | @gawdbrudder
Tune in to ChabDog Sports Talk’s “Black Sunday Segue” Show. Your mind, it’ll blow. And before you go whole hog in with the Niners, fully consider the sidewinding destruction to be wrought by the sidearm slings of Sideshow bobbing and lobbing Phat Pat. Plus prop bets that will shock and appall you.
‘s results:
for putting this game behind a paywall
Yes, it’s tough work picking against the spread, and the season’s getting a little long in the tooth, with those intense divisional matchups coming front and center. Steelers vs. Browns, Seahawks vs. Rams, Titans vs. Jags, Jets vs. Bills, G-men vs. Commies, Bears vs. Lions, are a serious seven that come to mind. One thing I do know …. the Streets of San Francisco are now clean, just like the royal penis, and Fall freshening up is definitely in order. And after pre-visioning the course of events on sacred Sunday, we’ll turn to Monday night, when tush push meets walk this way Pat …. and the question remains, who will get pushed ot the sidewalk.
–Phls fail in close-out game No. 1, when they plead Nola contendere.
Phillies appear to be on a mission, while the Braves seemed a bit apathetic, without reservation.
eachment inquiry.
now has been deftly covering up a major defect at QB… BILLS
dire straits?
