Joe Paterno: The Penn State Head Coach Remains the Integrity of College Football

Where would college football be without Joe Paterno?

He remains a legend in the game of college football for never letting go of his integrity cap.

Paterno had an unfortunate incident to report way back in allegedly 2002 involving his former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky. Sandusky has since been charged with sexually abusing eight boys.  

Penn State's athletic director Tim Curley and Gary Schultz, the school's vice president for finance and business were charged with perjury and failure to report after an investigation into the allegations.

This involves involves Paterno because he "alerted the athletic director Tim Curley about an incident in 2002 where a graduate assistant for the team said he saw Sandusky sexually assaulting a boy in the shower at Lasch Football Building on the Penn State campus. The graduate student said he went to Paterno’s home the next day and described what he had seen. Paterno, in turn, told Curley."

Sandusky was relased on $100,000 bond after being arraigned on exactly 40 criminal counts according to the state attorney general office.

"He was charged with multiple counts of involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, corruption of minors, endangering the welfare of a child, indecent assault and unlawful contact with a minor as well as single counts of aggravated indecent assault and attempted indecent assault."  

Penn State president Graham Spanier said, "I have known and worked daily with Tim and Gary for more than 16 years," he said. "I have complete confidence in how they handled the allegations about a former university employee." 

Sandusky won two national championships with Paterno in the 80s ('77-99 was DC) and has since retired from coaching. However, Sandusky had previously worked with at-risk children at his Second Mile foundation.

Paterno is the first thing people think about when Penn State is brought up, and after all, their campus is nicknamed Happy Valley for a reason. It is a great city with great coaches and fans. It is difficult times just like these where we must think of what is positive about college football. 

Who knows if Penn State football would be as relevant as it currently is without Paterno and we should be thanking our lucky stars he is still around. Most coaches are put on the hot seat or are not welcomed after a certain amount of years, but Paterno has earned the trust and continually proven time after time that he is as loyal and is about as full of integrity as it gets. 

It is sad that news like this takes away from the season that Penn State is currently having. They are the lone undefeated team in the Big Ten with their only loss of the season against the Crimson Tide. 

Unfortunately, Penn State is idle this weekend so instead of possibly talking about their victory, we instead are faced about talking about something that allegedly occurred off the field.

Paterno is as loyal of a man and coach as there is, especially since football and his collegiate athletes mean the world to him. Sandusky was expected to take over for Paterno at Penn State in the 90's before the coordinator eventually retired.

"Joe Pa" continues to thrive in the landscape of college football as he just passed Eddie Robinson for the most wins in FBS history (409). May the legacy of Paterno continue to grow with his Nittany Lions having a legit chance to play in the first ever Big Ten Championship being played at Lucas Oil Stadium on Dec. 3.