Streaking Penguins still striving to reach full potential
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YOUNGSTOWN -- Despite coming off its third straight win, the Youngstown State football team feels like it still hasn't reached its full potential.
The Penguins have a pair of ranked wins and back-to-back road wins, and in that stretch, they're scoring 44 points per game, while giving up 22.7. On paper, that would be a recipe for success, yet the Penguins believe their best football lies ahead.
"We know what we're capable of, but we haven't put it all together yet," YSU head coach Doug Phillips said. "I think our guys are confident that we can do this.
"We want to be the best version of ourselves, and this is the month that you gotta do it."
"Confidence" is the key word, especially as the sixth-ranked Penguins continue to climb the Stats Perform Top-25 rankings each week.
Winning usually breeds confidence, but for YSU that's more of a tempered workmanlike confidence, rather than an exuberant, chest-thumping confidence.
"We haven't been getting too big," fifth-year linebacker Mike Wells said. "We're obviously aware that we're rolling right now, and we want to keep it that way, but it's kind of just been like a laser focus. In the locker room, guys aren't worried about the rankings, guys aren't worried about who we're playing, it's just been a get your hard hat and go to work day. That's how we're approaching each week, and I think that's what's been helping us."
Each week, YSU simply "wants to go 1-0." It may sound basic, but it's a mentality that has worked for the Penguins so far and they don't plan on changing it anytime soon.
"I think we just have a level mindset. Every week it's 1-0. We don't get ahead of ourselves," fifth-year quarterback Beau Brungard said. "But momentum's a real thing. It's really hard to win road games in this conference. Every single week is going to be a challenge. So I think we're feeling good in the locker room, but we just have our heads down and we're going to work."
YSU hopes to continue that momentum this weekend as it returns to Stambaugh Stadium for homecoming to face newly-ranked No. 19 Northern Iowa on Saturday at 6 p.m. (ESPN+/570 WKBN). It'll be the fourth ranked opponent that the Penguins have faced in five weeks.
Even though the Panthers have largely dominated the series overall, the Penguins have won the last two meetings, albeit, they've been battles in recent years with the last three meetings between the two teams being decided by a combined total of seven points.
"It's a great program with great tradition," Phillips said. "It's tough for any coach coming into a program to get what your beliefs are, what your standards are in recruiting your players and for [UNI head coach Todd Stepsis] to do that in a year and a half, two years, it's pretty impressive."
In the past, games against Northern Iowa have diminished once promising seasons for YSU. For example, in 2005, the Penguins rolled into the UNI Dome at 7-1, but lost to the Panthers and missed the FCS playoffs. Then in 2006 and 2023, a pair of YSU playoff teams each lost to UNI.
So the Penguins know what's at stake, especially facing a Panthers team that also has momentum, having knocked off two other top-10 teams in Illinois State and North Dakota over the past two weeks.
"I can tell there's a brotherhood there and Coach Stepsis has done a great job of doing that," Phillips said. "With their wins at home against ranked opponents, they're opportunistic. You fumble a kickoff, they're going to score. They get a punt block, they're going to score. Interception, they're going to score the next series.
"It's the UNI that you see, but now it's [Stepsis'] program, and you can see the belief of those young men, believing in what they are doing."
At this point in the calendar, YSU has four games left, including three at home. With the their ambitions, the Penguins can ill afford to slip up as they look to solidify their resume for the FCS playoff selection committee.
"You gotta be ready for that 60-minute battle. It's going to take four quarters of football in league play, especially now when you get towards the end," Phillips said. "We're going into game eight, and we gotta be playing a lot better than we have been playing. Our young men know that, and that's our goal -- to be able to play as fast as possible come 6:02 Saturday night."