STATE COLLEGE He was the man in the middle of the Penn State defense that stuffed rushing attempt after rushing attempt and dropped Massachusetts quarterback Blake Frohnapfel three times Saturday at Beaver Stadium.

Shortly after the game ended, but long after his defense helped decide a 48-7 victory, defensive tackle Austin Johnson got a rundown of the statistics.The Minutemen rushed for just three yards against the Nittany Lions defense. Three. That number, it was speculated, could put the Nittany Lions in the running to be the top rush defense in the nation by the time the night ended."Let's hope so," the sophomore smiled. "That's definitely something we're trying to get to. Number one in rush defense, and number one in total defense as well."Penn State has reached half its goal.While they'll have to settle for a comparatively disappointing but still dominant 10th in the nation in total defense, the Nittany Lions will sit alone atop the national leaderboard in rushing defense as they head into Saturday's conference showdown with Northwestern at Beaver Stadium.A month into the season, only three NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision teams have allowed less than 200 total rushing yards, and of those three, only the Nittany Lions have played four games. They're allowing 49.5 rushing yards per game, the only team in the nation whose opponents are averaging less than 50. To top it off, the Lions are one of just three teams allowing less than 2 yards per carry, and at 1.75, the only one allowing less than 1.8."Their defensive line is really good," Minutemen coach Mark Whipple said, trying to explain the reason for his team's struggles against Penn State. "We knew we weren't going to be able to run the ball that well."But I thought we'd be able to do something."So far against the Nittany Lions, nobody has.Rutgers is the only team that rushed for more than 100 yards against Penn State, and it took 31 carries to get to 102. Akron's 69 yards on 25 carries, was the second-best total. But in the opener against Central Florida in Dublin's Croke Park Classic, the Golden Knights managed just 24 yards on 29 carries."Our plan is to make it one-dimensional," coach James Franklin said.Maybe the Wildcats will offer the Nittany Lions a chance to pad their lead, too. At 115 yards per game, Northwestern ranks 103rd in the nation out of 125 teams in rushing offense.