College football

Big Ten: Vindication complete for JoePa, Penn State

EAST LANSING, Mich. - As the Penn State players bounced around the field, exchanging hugs and saluting the thousands of fans who came to see the Nittany Lions become champions again, Joe Paterno ducked and ran for cover.

After 40 seasons and 353 wins, the coach, 78, has been part of more celebrations than he can count.

But for his players, it has been a long hard road to the program's first appearance in the Bowl Championship Series.

JoePa and the fifth-ranked Nittany Lions locked up their first Big Ten title in 11 years and the BCS bid that goes with it by defeating Michigan State 31-22 Saturday.

Michael Robinson ran for 90 yards and a touchdown and passed for another score, and Alan Zemaitis had three interceptions for Penn State.

Coming off a 4-7 season, its fourth losing year in five, Penn State tied Ohio State for the Big Ten lead but will get the automatic BCS bid because it beat the Buckeyes in October.

"I've been around a lot of good football teams and I've been in a lot of locker rooms where we've felt pretty good about what we had done," Paterno said. "The kids are the ones that are all fired up and they should be, because they went though all that junk - the losing years, everyone doubting them and they got together and went to work. They're the guys that should be happy."

Michigan State, which began the season 4-0, finished with six losses in seven games to post consecutive losing seasons for the first time since 1992.

When it was over, the Nittany Lions partied in Spartan Stadium, but Paterno bolted to the tunnel with his head down, looking up just long enough to give the Penn State section a wave.

"He deserves it," said Robinson, who had a 33-yard TD run in the second quarter. "He really does. He's worked so hard. He stayed with us. People told him to retire. Now look at him. Nobody's saying to retire and no more Joe must go Web sites. None of that. I'm just so happy for him."

Paterno wasn't too happy with his team last week, so he booted the whole bunch from practice Tuesday.

"They took it," Paterno said. "Nobody pouted. The captains got them together and all's well that ends well."

N'WESTERN 38, ILLINOIS 21: Brett Basanez threw for 240 yards and Tyrell Sutton ran for 212 as the visiting Wildcats handed the Illini their ninth straight loss.

Basanez, making his 39th consecutive start, became the third Big Ten quarterback to pass for more than 10,000 yards in his career, reaching 10,164 to join Purdue's Drew Brees and Iowa's Chuck Long. He also rushed for 85 yards and two touchdowns as Northwestern's league-leading offense rolled up 36 first downs and gained 596 yards.

Northwestern reached seven victories for the first time since it shared the Big Ten championship in 2000 and can look forward to a bowl game next month.

IOWA 52, MINNESOTA 28: Ed Hinkel caught four touchdowns to set a Kinnick Stadium record, Damian Sims scored on a 71-yard run and the host Hawkeyes shut down the nation's No. 1 rushing offense.

Iowa improved its bowl prospects with its fifth straight victory over the Gophers, who lost star running back Laurence Maroney in the first quarter and never recovered after falling behind 35-0 less than 25 minutes in.

PURDUE 41, INDIANA 14: The Boilermakers took advantage of five turnovers, getting three touchdown runs from Kory Sheets and two from Dorien Bryant to cruise past the Hoosiers. Purdue claimed the Old Oaken Bucket for the fourth straight season and the eighth time in Joe Tiller's nine seasons as coach.

[Last modified November 20, 2005, 00:55:14]