No. 13 Penn State football’s defense forced three interceptions and allowed just four third-down conversions on 18 attempts. Still, the 9.5-point favorites fell 24-20 to the Badgers on Saturday at Beaver Stadium.

This feeling is becoming all too familiar for Penn State fans. The conflicting anger of having elite defenses wasted by offenses who can’t consistently hold their end of the bargain.

While D’Anton Lynn’s unit was by no means perfect, there’s no excuse to lose a football game when the other team throws a trio of turnovers and 147 total yards through three quarters.

An example in recent memory would be the 2025 College Football Playoff semifinal against Notre Dame, where the blue and white defense forced two interceptions, surrendered just 2.8 yards per carry to a backfield that featured two future first-round picks at running back, and allowed 23 points to a Fighting Irish offense that averaged 53 points per game.

Even more recently, in fact almost exactly one year ago, Penn State lost 30-24 in overtime to Oregon, in which the defense got off the field on 12 of its 18 third-down defenses against a top-10 ranked opponent.

Somehow, through all of the overhaul for the Nittany Lions this offseason under the Matt Campbell regime, that fate remains.

“It’s going to be certain times where the defense is going to keep letting up scores, and the offense is going to keep us in the game,” defensive tackle Armstrong Nnodim said after Penn State’s loss to Wisconsin. “I feel like the defense could have done better at picking up the offense.”

In Saturday night’s loss to Wisconsin, Rocco Becht and the offense managed a single field goal on seven second-half drives, including an inexcusable four straight three-and-outs that burnt just 6:24 off the clock while protecting a multi-score lead.

“We had so many opportunities to put the game away, and we just didn’t take advantage of those opportunities,” Matt Campbell said postgame.

But even up 17-0, Penn State’s defense directly accounted for six of those points stemming from a Josiah Zayas pick-six in the second quarter. Kicker Ryan Barker added two field goals in the first and fourth quarters, the first coming after Penn State’s defense forced a three-and-out that set the offense up on Wisconsin’s 40-yard line.

The only touchdown Becht and company “authentically” produced came after Daryus Dixson’s interception in the second quarter, which brought the ball all the way to Wisconsin’s 11-yard line. It’s no exaggeration to say the blue and white defense, and even special teams, did all the heavy lifting against an unranked Wisconsin team.

Defenders have echoed Nnodim’s sentiment of “backing the offense” throughout the locker room in just four games against Marshall, Temple, Buffalo, and now Wisconsin.

Specifically, linebacker Tony Rojas said, “Whether it’s the defense that’s not playing the best or the offense, we just have to have each other’s back,” after Penn State’s offense struggled against Temple back in Week 2.

Defenders aren’t ever expected to throw their offense under the bus, but when is the expectation to reciprocate winning football held accountable for?

“Our defense, I have nothing but love for all those guys,” offensive lineman Trevor Buhr said after the loss. “They had an amazing game. We’ve got to help them out more.”

Lynn and his defenders are clearly setting the standard for a shutdown defense, and some will point blame for the whopping 208 Badger yards allowed in the fourth quarter, but Wisconsin possessed the ball for 9:24 in the fourth quarter, running a ridiculous 26 plays.

For context, almost 40% of Wisconsin’s offensive plays came in the fourth quarter. That’s a difficult task for any unit to handle, but they still shouldered the burden and took accountability afterward.

“We gotta be better on defense. [We] should never let up 20 points,” linebacker Kooper Ebel, who led the team with eight tackles, said after the game.

After the disaster that followed Penn State’s 2025 loss to Oregon, we’ve seen how one setback can derail an entire season. So no, Penn State’s season is not over by any means.

However, a Week 4 loss to an unranked Badger team leaves Campbell and his men with zero room for error in challenging road matchups against Northwestern, Washington, and No. 18 Michigan, along with the White Out against No. 12 USC.

“I know I’ve said this multiple times, but adversity is what college football is about; the ability to overcome adversity and the ability to unify and rally forward,” Campbell said. “The reality of it is, these are all correctable things if we’re really being humble enough to make the right corrections.”

Simply put, Penn State’s defense can’t pick up the slack anymore. Instead, the offense needs to uphold a standard week in, week out.