When Saquon Barkley surprised nobody by declaring for the NFL draft, a month after Joe Moorhead left to become Mississippi State's head coach (also expected), a narrative was born.
Penn State's dynamic offense, the team's defining unit during a 22-win stretch over two seasons, would fall off in 2018, perhaps substantially so. Barkley, the generational running back who put himself in Penn State's GOAT conversation, and Moorhead, whose brilliant playcalls revived the unit, would be too much for the Nittany Lions to replace.
This is why Penn State wouldn't truly challenge Ohio State and others in the Big Ten, and why the Lions wouldn't earn their first CFP berth.