On a cold, sunny morning police monitored roads and
patrolled from the air ahead of the mid-day match between No.12 ranked Penn
State and No. 17 Nebraska that will be the first game in more than four decades
without Joe Paterno, one of the most respected coaches in US college football.
Police and university officials are hoping to avoid a
repeat of the mob violence that erupted on Wednesday evening after university trustees
fired Paterno, 84, and college president Graham Spanier.
"There is going to be a significant police presence
at Beaver Stadium this weekend," Captain John Gardner, of the State
College Police, told reporters on Friday.
Facebook and Twitter feeds will also be monitored.
University assistant coach Mike McQueary will also be
absent from the game after being put on paid administrative leave on Friday.
McQueary testified to a grand jury that he saw former
assistant coach Gerald "Jerry" Sandusky rape a boy in the showers at
a campus locker room in 2002 and said he reported what he saw to Paterno.
The university had earlier barred him from attending
Saturday's game, citing "multiple" threats against him.
Paterno said he was told that Sandusky engaged in sexually
inappropriate behavior with a young boy. He told his boss but did not call the
police.
Sandusky, 67, ran the Second Mile charity program for
at-risk children and retained access to Penn State facilities after his
retirement in 1999. Prosecutors said he met all his alleged victims through the
nonprofit group, which says it cut ties with him in 2008.
He was charged last Saturday with sexually abusing eight
young boys over more than a decade and former Penn State athletic director Tim
Curley and former finance official Gary Schultz, were charged with failing to
report an incident.
Sandusky, Curley and Schultz have all denied the charges.
Despite the heavy police presence, the campus of 45,000
students in central Pennsylvania was buzzing with activity early in the day
with fans setting up tailgate parties that included tables laden with food and
coolers filled with beer and wine in parking lots and on land near the stadium.
Scott Doht, of Lyons, Nebraska was making eggs for a
morning omelet with about 10 close friends. He said he would be rooting for his
home team and was looking forward to the game.
"They've been very welcoming to us," said Doht,
who flew in just for the game. "It means a lot to us. We feel like it's a
good rivalry and we look forward to hosting them next year." Jeff
Beitinger, 34, of Sinking Spring, Pennsylvania, said the game "is the
first step toward healing the Penn State community and supporting the
team." Instead of the traditional white, students attending the game were
encouraged to wear blue - the color associated with a "stop child
abuse" campaign.
College football in the United States is a popular sport
that is televised to viewers across the country every Saturday during the
season in late summer and autumn. Penn State's Beaver Stadium, which seats
about 106,000, is one of the largest.
Late on Friday night, instead of the usual pre-game
rally, an estimated 10,000 students conducted a candlelight vigil in front of
the main administration building for the young boys who were victims of alleged
sex abuse.
"People want to move forward to rebuild the
reputation that Penn State had, and the game tomorrow is going to be the start
of it," student Laura Ross, 21, said at the traditional home game tent
encampment outside Beaver Stadium known as "Paternoville." Sandusky
was once considered a likely successor to Paterno. The grand jury alleged,
among other charges, that Sandusky had sexually assaulted a boy in a Penn State
football locker room in 2002 and university officials failed to report the
incident.
Paterno has not been charged but one of his sons
confirmed that his father had hired J. Sedgwick "Wick" Sollers, a
prominent Washington criminal defense lawyer.
The scandal reverberated as far as Wall Street when
ratings agency Moody's warned of a possible credit downgrade for Penn State.
The agency said the scandal could lead to lawsuits and
settlements, weaker student demand, declines in philanthropic giving, and
significant management or governance changes.
Penn State's board of trustees on Friday appointed
Kenneth Frazier, the chief executive of drug maker Merck & Co. and a Penn
State alumnus, to head a special committee to investigate the events that lead
up to the charges against Sandusky.
The mother of one boy who was an alleged victim of sexual
abuse said on Friday she feared Sandusky could have had many more victims than
the eight covered by the charges.
"The people that hid this need to pay for their
actions. They allowed this to happen to a lot of kids," the woman told
ABC's "Good Morning America." The program did not identify her and
disguised her voice and appearance.
