Two minutes and nine seconds were left in the second quarter when Tyler Duzansky snapped the football. The ball found the hands of Riley Thompson, who planted it into the Beaver Stadium grass with the laces facing northwest. Sander Sahaydak took three strides forward, planted his foot, and let the ball sail.

He missed.

Sahaydak, who had just won a tight competition to become Penn State football’s starting placekicker, was benched at halftime. Missing one field goal against West Virginia in a season opener was bad enough. Missing two meant Alex Felkins had the starting job.

Sahaydak took the next day to be upset about his performance. He apologized to his Penn State teammates, who got over the situation with relative ease. After that, it was back to business.

“[It was] just straight back to work on what you do and whatever that role meant,” Sahaydak said. “So if that meant stepping back to be a backup kicker, I was going to be the best backup kicker in the country. Stepping back to kick onside kicks, I’m going to be the best onside kick kicker in the country.”

From that point on, Sahaydak was a pretty good backup kicker. He didn’t kick another field goal for the rest of the season, but he converted on all five PATs he was given after the West Virginia blunders.

Sahaydak has been brutally open and honest about what happened against West Virginia. It wasn’t his first action in college football, but it was certainly the moment that has stood out the most in his Penn State career.

Despite all that, Sahaydak felt those chances, and the ones that came before and after, have prepped him for the 2024 season as he’s again fighting for a starting spot.

“I think it helps a lot. I remember stepping in for my first game against Purdue in 2022. Yeah, that was a whole different world for me going from high school to kicking in college,” Sahaydak said. “It’s not the way you like to learn the lesson, but even going last year to West Virginia. Yeah, it sucks at the moment, but I think it still helps.”

Penn State has three placekickers all competing for one role. Sahaydak and redshirt freshman Ryan Barker are leading the pack with Tulsa transfer Chase Meyer bringing up the rear as he adjusts to life with Penn State.

If it comes down to Sahaydak and Barker, experience may help the former. Special teams coordinator Justin Lustig said in the case of a tie, the team might lean on a player who already has the in-game reps.

The race for that role won’t be left up to chance. Every kick is tracked so that when August 31 rolls around, Lustig and his staff will know every one of their kickers’ habits.

Sahaydak didn’t seem worried. Similar to Felkins, Sahaydak understood, perhaps more harshly, that fortunes can change in an instant. That wasn’t cause for concern. It’s only football.

“It’s all just a game, right? It’s all kind of the same,” Sahaydak said. “So you just focus on what you can do, and you take every opponent one at a time. You don’t try and focus on the outside forces and stuff like that.”