From the players to the coaches to the fans, everybody brought their Saturday best against Indiana, but in keeping with the theme of this cursed season, it wasn't enough. The Hoosiers prevailed, and in heart-breaking fashion, narrowly avoiding a costly upset loss and denying Coach Terry Smith and the beleaguered Penn State fanbase the signature win they deserve. And yet amid that disappointment there also arose a powerful reminder of everything that makes Penn State football great - the resilient stuff that will survive this moment as it has endured many tougher trials in the past and will be here waiting, strong as ever, when the storm breaks and the next coach arrives.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

For delivery before Thanksgiving, place your orders before kickoff of the Penn State-Michigan State game on Saturday, November 15!

Following the annual dispiriting loss to Ohio State - somehow both more AND less discouraging than usual - the unranked Penn State Nittany Lions return home to face undefeated and second-ranked Indiana as double-digit underdogs... IN FOOTBALL. What is this world coming to? And what's next? Real "wrath of God" type stuff. Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies. Rivers and seas boiling. Forty years of darkness. Earthquakes. Volcanoes. The dead rising from the grave.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

Bye Week's over now. Back to the real world.

Penn State didn't get the win in Terry Smith's debut as interim head coach versus Iowa, but they did cover the spread for the first time this season. Can the Nittany Lions make it a streak and keep the margin within three touchdowns in Columbus? It seems like the best a beleaguered Nittany Nation can hope for. The guys ponder PSU's quest for small comfort against the top-ranked Buckeyes and a college coaching carousel that is quickly spinning out of control.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

Time to refocus on football, concentrate on all that lies ahead, and make an uplifting episode about the future and its boundless possibilities. Or at least that was the plan for this week. Then Horne got into the good stuff, and, well, it turns out we're not all the way over the breakup just yet. Maybe next week. 

After all, just like the Penn State football team's season and the Athletic Department's quest for a championship-winning coach: If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

What began with such promise and hope in the wake of Bill O'Brien's departure has now come to an end in a fashion heretofore unseen at Penn State. James Franklin has been relieved of his duties as head football coach of the Nittany Lions.

Athletic Director Pat Kraft has addressed Nittany Nation about the decision and interim head coach Terry Smith, a Nittany Lion through and through, has previewed what's next for the team's team six regular season games.

Way more ground to cover than we can handle in a single episode, but the guys at least begin to unpack some of the most monumental news in the history of Penn State football.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

From bad to worse to inconceivable (and yes, we know what it means).

After another picture-perfect afternoon and wonderful weekend of celebration in Happy Valley was soured by an inexplicably dysfunctional football performance, Kevin and Chris trudged their way down from Beaver Stadium to Landon's Downtown studio to lay down some instant reactions. "Enjoy" this little bonus content in its audio format here or as video on For The Blogy's YouTube: https://youtu.be/vkWsaL01UFw

The usual Pregame Show and Podcast with the full crew will be coming later in the week, and of course, we'll be responding to any and all breaking news in the world of Penn State football. Hang in there, Nittany Lions fans.

HOSTED BY: Landon Tengwall, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

FRODO glances at SAM ... he is WEEPING.

CLOSE ON: FRODO wrapping an ARM around SAM’S SHOULDER.

FRODO  (calm)
I'm glad to be with you, Samwise  Gamgee, here at the end of all things.

HIGH WIDE: TWO TINY HOBBITS waiting to die amid a cataclysmic landscape ... LAVA erupts around them ... FIREBALLS rain down from the sky.

We SLOWLY FADE TO BLACK...

Happy Homecoming. Go State.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

Welp....

Nothing quite like a fresh Obligatory when the guys are (sadly) at their best to cure what ails ya.

Uncurl yourself from the fetal position, take your medicine, and crawl back into the saddle, because UCLA beckons, and you know you're too dumb, addicted, and masochistic to resist Saturday's siren song.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

PREEMPTIVE THERAPY! For us (some of us at least)? Certainly. For you too? Maybe also yes.

Every so often, there comes a crucial inflection point so fraught with meaning and pregnant with possibility, mere contemplation of its monumental consequence can bring the beholder to the brink of insanity. Such is the state of affairs for much of Penn State's fan base leading up to the third-ranked Nittany Lions' clash with Oregon under the lights at the White Out. With so much on the line, and every criticism of coach and quarterback in the biggest games ringing in their ears, Chris and Kevin air their hopes, fears, and frustrations about one game that could very well shatter or cement every narrative that has dogged this program for a decade, sorting through the jangled nerves, rankled senses, and shattered confidence brought on by a decade of perpetual failures in the moment of truth. All the while, Brandon and Mailman marvel at the grotesque spectacle of their tortured thinking.

If you need to share in the self-administered coping mechanisms to soothe your mania and hasten the long hours until game day (and GameDay), then join us and ease your troubled heart and mind. However, if you count yourself among the rational and well-adjusted, why then you can just kick back and join Mike the Mailman and Noble in their bemusement at the curious madness of Horne and Buchignani.

Either way, we can think of worse ways to count down the minutes to what promises to be among the most consequential evenings in Beaver Stadium history.

HOSTED BY: Brandon Noble, Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN

There's a shortage of folks who can seamlessly code switch between profane tirades over football minutiae and waxing poetic about the magic of the Nittany Valley, and the cast of this progrum oversamples that population to an absurd degree. With Noble again sleeping off old age this week, Mailman, Horne, and Buchignani are left to fill another hour-ish of nominally Penn State football-related #content, so kick back, relax, and enjoy the start to Penn State's bye week with the mix tape of eulogizing a Happy Valley icon, deep reflection on what it means to be a Penn Stater, and bitching about the insanity of the AP Poll that you didn't know you needed.

HOSTED BY: Mike "The Mailman" Herr, Kevin Horne, Chris Buchignani

The Obligatory PSU Podcast is brought to you all season long by Gold Hen, a Penn State alumni-owned company, makers of the truly one-of-a-kind Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix. Try it today by going to: GoldHenLLC.com

The unique flavor profile of Gold Hen Bloody Mary Mix complements a variety of alcohols and makes an excellent marinade or cooking ingredient.

The best way to support the show this season is to try some for yourself – go to GoldHenLLC.com and take 10% off at checkout with the promo code: MAILMAN