Penn State Football First Quarter: Houston 17, Penn State 0

DALLAS — Houston, we have a touchdown. Another one.

It took the Houston Cougars just 112 seconds on Monday to score its first TD in the TicketCity Bowl against Penn State.

The Cougars took the opening kickoff and went 76 yards in just six plays, all passes, for the game’s first points in the Cotton Bowl. The score came on a 40-yard strike from quarterback Case Keenum along the left sideline to Patrick Edwards, who beat PSU safety Malcolm Willis on the play.

On the drive, Keenum completed 4 of 6 passes for 81 yards — the Cougars had a five-yard penalty, hence the official drive of 76 yards — that included a 28-yarder to Justin Johnson. Matt Hogan kicked the PAT for a 7-0 lead.

The game is Penn State’s fourth since Joe Paterno was fired as head coach on Nov. 9 in the wake of the Sandusky child sex-abuse scandal. He was replaced by interim coach Tom Bradley. Since then, Penn State lost two of its final three regular season games to enter the bowl game with a 9-3 record, and 6-2 in the Big Ten, tied for first with Wisconsin in the Leaders Division.

The TicketCity Bowl is likely the final Penn State game for Bradley, in his 33rd season as a PSU coach, as well as most — if not all — of the Penn State coaching staff. Under the direction of acting athletic director Dave Joyner, a six-person Penn State committee has been conducting a search for a permanent head coach. The search, which began Nov. 28, is in Day 36. It has been 55 days since Paterno was fired.

Houston added a 35-yard field goal by Hogan to take a 10-0 lead with 9:12 to play in the first quarter. The Cougars’ scoring drive covered 38 yards in eight plays.

The Ciougars upped their lead to 17-0 with 2:35 in the first quarer, when Keenum threw an 8-yard TD to Johnson to cap a five-play, 50-yard yards.

In the first quarter, Keenum threw for 227 yards and two touchdowns on 21 of 29 passing. Edwards had four receptions for 112 yards.

Penn State quarterback Rob Bolden, by contrast, was 0 for 4 in the opening quarter.

Bolden started the game for Penn State. He was the Nittany Lions’ starting quarterback for the first seven games of 2011, then gave way to Matt McGloin. McGloin suffered a concussion in a fight with wideout Curtis Drake during a locker room fight during bowl preparations in University Park.

In Penn State’s first four drives, the Nittany Lions gained just 22 yards on 12 plays, eight of them runs, with nary a first down.

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