Penn State knew they had an uphill battle Saturday night at Wisconsin, but as they have done all season, the Nittany Lions gave it their all in the second half to earn a 28-13 victory and remain undefeated in front of a formidable opponent Showdown against Ohio State next weekend.

Entering the game, the Badgers had been playing their best football of the season offensively, largely due to the success they had on first downs. That wasn’t the case against Penn State, as Wisconsin managed just 126 yards on 27 first downs (11 total drives plus 16 gains). Additionally, when you consider that 61 of those yards came on just two plays, and the fact that PSU held the Badgers to 0 or negative yards on 11 of those 27 plays, it played a major role in the outcome.

“Obviously we knew they were going to make it difficult, as aggressive as they are and as athletic as they are,” Wisconsin’s head coach said Luke Fickell. “But that probably comes down primarily to our ability to stay on track, provide the offense and Braedyn (Locke) a chance. (There) they probably did the best job. We knew we wanted to stay out of third-and-long situations, but it really comes down to winning in the first period and I think that’s where we struggled the most.”

Report Card: Evaluating Penn State’s 28-13 win over Wisconsin

Despite these difficulties, Wisconsin still led Penn State 10-7 at halftime. An injury to the quarterback Drew Allar just complicated things for the Nittany Lions. But as is often the case with the top programs in the country, Penn State got a big chance from a safety midway through the third quarter when it needed it most Jaylen Reed Locke intercepted and took it back for a score.

“That probably hurts the most,” Fickell said. “I can’t say it took the crowd out of the game or anything like that. It’s just one of those situations where it puts a little more pressure on the defense to understand that somehow, some way Ways to make amends… These are exactly the things we need to find ways to do. We’ve been pretty good and well-equipped to handle some of these situations over the last few weeks, but this is a situation that’s really difficult to handle.”

Allar’s injury will be a big topic of conversation for Penn State fans and media this week, but backup quarterback Beau Pribula was more than able to hold its own in the second half. In addition to leading two scoring drives in the fourth quarter, Pribula also completed his final nine pass attempts, finishing 11 of 13 with 98 passing yards and a score.

Notebook: Penn State scores the “prettiest and ugliest” win and remains undefeated

“They did a really good job with him in the second half and caused us some problems,” Fickell said when asked about Pribula. “I wouldn’t say we weren’t prepared for (Pribula). As much as they prepare you for so many things, when you actually go into the game it becomes a slightly different game. It caused us some problems. So two things: Give them credit for having a plan when he’s in there, and I don’t think we did a good enough job of making sure we understood what he was going to do. But he also threw the football pretty darn well. He made some plays in the second half that were really, really great.”

Penn State now turns its attention to a top-five showdown with Ohio State next week at Beaver Stadium, while Wisconsin travels to Iowa. Before concluding his press conference, Fickell made it clear that the Nittany Lions are among the best in the conference. This is especially true for defense.

“This is a team we just played. If things don’t go well and the quarterback twists his knee, they could probably hang up their hat on defense and probably get by for a while. I think they’re so talented,” Fickell said.