The rancor of the Penn State fanbase spilled over and into the hardened veterans of Central Pennsylvania’s beat writers today. As SID Kris Peterson welcomed the gang into the press conference room, Altoona’s Cory Geiger cut in front of Harrisburg’s Greg Pickel. Pickel wouldn’t tolerate the slight, and he sent Geiger flying across two rows of seats with a shove.
Now, no one likes Geiger, so no one even raised an eyebrow over it. But 10 feet away, toward the front of the room, and just as Bob Flounders and Rich Scarcella began to have a heated exchange about fielding punts in a wind storm, Coach James Franklin, wearing a 1970’s-era olive-drab-green battle dress uniform, and black-and-green “jungle” boots, ran onto the stage, grabbed the microphone, and took control of the chaotic scene.