GAME ANALYSIS: Offense finally in sync

Penn's football team clicked offensively at Fordham on Saturday. NEW YORK -- The irony is thick. For 2 1/2 quarters, the Penn offense ran like a well-oiled machine. Quarterback Matt Rader was finally playing like the savior everyone expected him to be. Running back Jim Finn was making mincemeat of the Fordham defense. Even the Penn receivers were getting into the act. It almost seemed too good to be true. And it was. Midway through the third quarter, Rader came off the field holding his arm. He suffered a deep gash in his throwing arm and could not return to the game. His status is not certain for next week's game against Columbia. "I'm not sure how it happened," Penn coach Al Bagnoli said. "It almost looked like someone took a saw [to his arm]. I don't know if he caught a facemask or what happened." Onlookers on the Penn sideline said Rader had a flap of skin hanging from his upper arm. But no one was quite sure how it had happened. The only thing certain was that Penn's offense was in trouble. Prior to the injury, the Quakers offense dominated every imaginable category. Finn, to no one's surprise, turned in another workmanlike performance, rushing 29 times for a personal best 198 yards. He even got to show a rare burst of speed, taking a pitch around the corner for a 69-yard touchdown run. "He showed his speed on the touchdowns, and obviously if we need one or two yards, we're going to try to put the ball in his hands," Bagnoli said. "In crunchtime we certainly need him to be effective at what he does." Perhaps a bit more surprising was the solid play of running back Jason McGee. In Penn's first three games, McGee had only 11 yards on 11 carries. But thanks in part to a better performance from his offensive line, McGee carried seven times for 43 yards. The most pleasing development, however, for the Quakers offense was the success of the passing game. Rader had pass protection all game, and sliced the Fordham secondary like a surgeon. He connected with nine different receivers for 256 yards and three touchdowns, including a 39-yard prayer to David O'Neill to end the first half. Penn's offense was brutal and efficient, scoring touchdowns on five of its first six possessions. The Quakers built a 34-14 lead with 9:30 left in the third quarter, and all was well in the Quakers' world. The offense, which could not get anything going against Richmond, the offense which was almost outscored by its defense against Bucknell, was finally living up to the tremendous expectations placed upon it. But after the injury to Rader, the offense did not do much except run the clock down and hope Fordham would not catch up. "They obviously had us on our heels," Bagnoli said. "We made the decision that we were going to run Jim, and the offensive line was blocking pretty good all game, and we were fortunate that we made a few first downs and killed the clock." At first, Bagnoli rotated sophomore North Carolina transfer Reed Werner and freshman Edward Mebs -- also a transfer from Miami -- in at quarterback. Bagnoli decided to stick with Werner, who ended up completing one of four pass attempts for nine yards. But with the number one QB down, Finn took the lion's share of the offensive calls, including every play on Penn's last drive. Fordham coach Ken O'Keefe said he expected Finn to become the center of attention, but that Werner also posed some new problems for the Rams. "We knew [they were] going to get Finn actively involved," O'Keefe said. "[But Werner] is more fleet of foot. We were concerned about what they might do with him." As it turned out, Bagnoli and offensive coordinator Chuck Priore did not do much with Werner except have him give the ball to Finn, but in the end Werner got his job done. "Reed came through," Bagnoli said. "He killed the clock when he had to kill it." An outstanding Penn offensive performance should have answered a lot of questions about this Quakers team. Instead, it raises more. Was this "a breakout game," as Bagnoli said, or just a flash in the pan? Only another solid outing next week can put them to rest.

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