Jason Cabinda Shines For Penn State Football In Another Shaky Win

Penn State‘s struggles in the non-conference portion of the season have been one of the top storylines in the Big Ten through five weeks, but the Nittany Lions are continuing to produce standout defensive players who have helped them to a 4-1 start. Since Nyeem Wartman-White‘s season-ending injury during their opening week loss to Temple, the linebackers haven’t received a lot of attention because of the dominance of the defensive line. But that wasn’t the case on Saturday afternoon when Jason Cabinda helped the unit preserve another hard-fought win.

Cabinda, a sophomore linebacker from Flemington, N.J., played in five games as a freshman last season and has been thrown into regular action into 2015. He registered 23 tackles through the first four games but exploded with 14 stops against Army on Saturday. He also sacked Black Knights quarterback A.J. Schurr twice, one of which was a fourth down stop to seal the win for the Nittany Lions. He was part of a unit that forced three fumbles in the first half against the Black Knights.

Two sacks in a game by an individual player certainly isn’t out of the ordinary, but the fact that Schurr only attempted one pass the entire game makes it an odd and impressive stat. There’s a reason Army why runs the triple-option offense, and it’s because the academy doesn’t have the type of players on the offensive line to support a strong passing game. You obviously need to take a performance like this against a weak football team with a grain of salt, but it’s encouraging considering the defense may have to single-handedly keep the team in several games through the remainder of the season.

Up next for the Nittany Lions is Indiana, who was narrowly beaten by the defending national champions Saturday night and can score points as quickly as anyone with Nate Sudfeld at quarterback. Sudfeld is day-to-day with an ankle injury, but the fact remains that the defense will need a similar performance from the front seven this upcoming weekend if they want to give the fans a win on homecoming in Happy Valley.

Jason Shawley is a Featured Writer for www.RantSports.com covering Big Ten Football. Follow him on Twitter @jshawls.