To look at the statistics, it hardly seems possible that a football team could be this good.
The team leads the conference by scoring the most points per game and by allowing the fewest. It has remarkable offensive balance, gaining roughly the same amount of yardage on the ground and in the air. It has not given up a single point in the first quarter. It hardly ever turns the ball over, isn’t penalized often, and has yet to look at the scoreboard this season and see that it’s losing.
Ladies and gentlemen, the unbeaten 2025 Kutztown Golden Bears.
“I’ve never seen stats like this,” said IUP head coach Paul Tortorella, whose team takes on Kutztown on Saturday in the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference championship game. “Every stat is great—third down, fourth down, red zone, turnover ratio, time of possession, penalties, special teams.”
Therein lies the challenge for IUP, which is making its fourth trip to the PSAC title game since it was reinstituted in 2008.
How do you attack a team that seems to have no weakness?
“You’ve got to run your offense,” Tortorella said. “They haven’t played us yet. We can’t get enamored. We have to do what we do. If it’s good enough, great. If not, that’s fine. But they haven’t played us yet.”
It could be argued that Kutztown hasn’t really played anyone all year.
The Golden Bears are 10-0, and in only one of those games was the score close in the fourth quarter. Last week against Bloomsburg, Kutztown found itself in a ball game in the final quarter and held on for a 35-27 win. The 27 points allowed is the most in any game this season, and the eight-point margin is by far the closest anyone has come to beating the Golden Bears.
Tortorella said this year’s Kutztown team is easily among the best he’s seen in the PSAC since he arrived at IUP in 1995 as the defensive coordinator. Since he became head coach in 2017, Tortorella said the 2022 Shepherd team that IUP beat in the PSAC title game, but then lost to in the playoffs, is similar to Kutztown.
“Kutztown and Shepherd in 2022 are the best,” he said. “Shepherd had an NFL quarterback (Tyson Bagent). Take him away, it’s a different story. Kutztown’s best defensive player hasn’t played much. Their running back’s been hurt. The only position with a drop-off would be quarterback. They’ve got depth everywhere else.”
This will be Kutztown’s seventh appearance in the PSAC championship game and sixth time in the past seven seasons. The Golden Bears are the two-time defending conference champions, having won this game the past two years, beating Slippery Rock in 2023 and California last year.
Under head coach Jim Clements, who won his 100th career game at Kutztown last week, the Golden Bears are consistently good. Just look at their statistics.
“He’s a great coach,” Tortorella said. “When he got the job, they were mid-level. Now he has 100 wins.”
Kickoff on Saturday at Kutztown is at noon. Listen to it live on U92.5.
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