How big is Penn State football vs. Ohio State? Ranking the Lions 9 biggest Big Ten games

This may be college football's biggest game yet in 2023: Penn State football vs. Ohio State, Saturday in the Horseshoe. Noon kickoff.

Big Ten title implications. College Football Playoff positioning. A top-five ranking on the line.

Plus, Penn State coach James Franklin has only beaten the Buckeyes once in nine tries. He's never won 11 games in a regular season, nor qualified for college football's final four. This game could go a long way to getting him both.

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Saturday marks the 30th anniversary of Penn State playing Ohio State as dual members of the Big Ten. (The Lions are just 8-22 in those meetings).

How important is Saturday's game to Penn State now — in its entire Big Ten tenure?

We're ranking the Lions' top games since joining the league in 1993, win or lose. Nine games that mattered most:

9. Penn State 22, Indiana 18 (Nov. 13, 2004)

The Lions were mired in their worst stretch in modern program history — a six-game losing streak and four losing seasons in five years.

Was there really any hope for Joe Paterno and his staff, for a neutered offense whose best receiver was a quarterback?

The Lions, however, finally broke 20 points and made a gallant goal-line stand in the closing moments. They celebrated as if they had just won a Big Ten title, no matter the ragged opponent or nearly empty stadium.

Maybe they just needed some belief. Penn State would win the next week, as well, and 14 of its next 15 games.

8. Ohio State 39, Penn State 38 (Oct. 28, 2017)

The 7-0 Lions were ranked No. 2 with Heisman Trophy frontrunner Saquon Barkley. They had won 16 of their last 17 and seemed primed to qualify for their first playoff.

Who could stop them?

Penn State jumped out to 14-0 lead and led 35-20 on the road before a disastrous fourth quarter similar to the wild Rose Bowl defeat 10 months earlier that derailed them.

If the Lions had held on to win in Columbus, do they fend off defeat the following week at Michigan State?

This kept them out of the playoff, shifted their national standing and potentially scuffed their recruiting profile.

7. Penn State 24, Wisconsin 21 OT (Nov. 24, 2012)

A cathartic release to the most difficult football year imaginable — the Sandusky scandal, Joe Paterno's firing and death, NCAA sanctions and player defections.

First-year head coach Bill O'Brien, with the help of his player-leaders, not only kept the team together but inspired and won more than most anyone expected. So much so that O'Brien earned a National Coach of the Year award.

The Lions were ineligible for a bowl invitation because of sanctions related to the scandal, so this Senior Day game would have to do. Penn State persevered for a 24-21 overtime victory in blustery snow flurries to secure a winning season once thought impossible.

6. Minnesota 24, Penn State 23 (Nov. 6, 1999)

The undefeated, No. 2 team in the nation seemed driven to play for a national title.

Only three regular-season games remained, two in Beaver Stadium. The Lions would be heavy favorites in all, starting with unranked Minnesota.

The host Lions led by a touchdown early but could never pull away, missing on a clinching touchdown pass attempt near the end and electing to punt rather than try a long field goal.

Leading 23-21 late, it would be up Penn State's all-star defense once more, which collapsed under strange circumstances. It started by inexplicably yielding a deep pass in the middle of the field.

The clincher: The Gophers' last-gasp, fourth-and-16 heave toward the left sideline was batted into the air by one player, somehow scooped and caught by Minnesota's Arland Bruce for a first down.

A few moments later, Dan Nystrom's 32-yard game-winning field goal stunned the crowd.

Crushed, the Lions would lose the next two games and end up in the Alamo Bowl. They fell to 5-7 the next season.

5. Iowa 24, Penn State 23 (Nov. 8, 2008)

The Lions were, for all intents and purposes, one win away from an undefeated regular season and a trip to the BCS National Championship game after conquering Ohio State and resting during a bye week.

But Penn State struggled on a windy, raw afternoon in Iowa, and turned the ball over late in the fourth quarter when trying to run out the game leading 23-21 − like it had nine years earlier against Minnesota.

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The unranked Hawkeyes walked it off with a last-second, 31-yard field goal by Daniel Murray.

Penn State was sent to the Rose Bowl while one-loss Florida beat Oklahoma in the national title game.

4. Penn State 10, Illinois 7 (Oct. 29, 2011)

Who could have imagined the gravity of this day for those in State College?

Amid a Halloween snow, the Lions won with defense, their fourth victory by six points or less that season. This one materialized, first, with a desperate, fourth-quarter touchdown drive, then an Illinois kicker banging a field goal attempt off an upright on the final play.

It was Joe Paterno's 409th victory, giving him the all-time Division I lead over former Grambling State University legend Eddie Robinson.

It would also be his last. Less than two weeks later he was fired in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky child sexual abuse scandal.

3. Penn State 38, Wisconsin 31 (Dec. 3, 2016)

The streak just kept building, one wild, rollicking, improbable victory after another.

This one started as bleak as any, trailing Wisconsin and defensive nightmare TJ Watt 28-7 late in the first half.

But Trace McSorley kept bombing away and Penn State's defense held at the end, coming back to win its first and only Big Ten Championship Game.

It would culminate Penn State's unexpected, five-year recovery from NCAA sanctions.

2. Penn State 24, Ohio State 21 (Oct. 22, 2016)

One of the most improbable victories in school history was ignited by one of its most iconic plays.

The Lions were 20-point underdogs to the No. 2 Buckeyes and seemed, finally, about to cave early in the second half. Instead, they recovered with the help of two blocked kicks — the second knocked down by Marcus Allen and scooped up by Grant Haley, who returned it for the winning points.

The unlikely victory drove Penn State to a nine-game winning streak and Big Ten title. It was Franklin's first victory over a ranked opponent and remains a signature win of his tenure.

1. Penn State 35, Illinois 31 (Nov. 12, 1994)

One of the greatest teams in school history — one of the most prolific college offenses ever — etched its legacy this day.

Consider: This group averaged 47 points a game for the season, employed a No. 1 NFL Draft pick (tailback Ki-Jana Carter), a College Football Hall of Fame quarterback (Kerry Collins) and an array of future pros at receiver, fullback and across the line.

It remains Penn State's last undefeated team.

But how would these Lions be remembered, if much at all, for not rallying from a 21-0 deficit in a cold rain in Champaign, Ill.?

They did it, of course, by pulling off one great offensive drives in school history: 96 yards with six minutes left, down by three.

Collins executed the numbing, 14-play drive to perfection against the Illini and their trio of All-America linebackers in Dana Howard, Simeon Rice and Kevin Hardy. Fullback Brian Milne, the cancer survivor, crashed in for the winning PSU points.

They won their final three after this, including an anti-climatic Rose Bowl to finish 12-0 and No. 2 in the final major polls as No. 1 Nebraska defeated No. 3 Miami (Fla.), 24-17 in the Orange Bowl to claim the national title.

Penn State's best Big Ten team, still.

Frank Bodani covers Penn State football for the York Daily Record and USA Today Network. Contact him at  fbodani@ydr.com and follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter, @YDRPennState.

This article originally appeared on York Daily Record: Penn State football vs. Ohio State: Ranking best Big Ten games