By: Bill Livingston (Cleveland Plain Dealer) –

Wisconsin could have been the game where it all began for Terrelle Pryor.

There was the drive he led against the clock, through the air, suspect arm and all, and the game-stealing option run that revealed a gear previously unseen in the smooth, gliding freshman quarterback. “It’s a man’s world out there,” running back Beanie Wells, the big back who was often too fragile to put that world on his shoulders, told him before the drive began.

Then came Penn State, the night national television rediscovered Ohio State after Pryor had played better than anybody else in the trouncing at Southern Cal. Penn State, in the game for the roses, brought the thorns.

It was, at once, the unmaking and re-making of the most physically gifted quarterback Ohio State has ever had. Art Schlichter, for the record, was 25 pounds lighter and three inches shorter than Pryor’s 6-6, 235. Schlichter also played a generation before the size, speed and scouting of today.

Pryor might fulfill all the big expectations that arose when the Big Ten media named him preseason Player of the Year. That is only partly because of his imposing physical package and the stronger, more accurate arm he showed in the spring game. It is also because of the intangibles. Little that Pryor has said since Penn State is not about payback, redemption, and personal improvement.

People see his size and speed, and they think Vince Young (6-5, 230) has scrounged around and found some more NCAA eligibility.

People had rainbows in their eyes when they saw Young in his last two years. But the Texas quarterback really didn’t develop strategies for adversity in college; hence, his struggles in the NFL. “Just play,” Texas coaches told him.

After the most ballyhooed high school career in the country, Pryor encountered collegiate adversity early. “Just learn from it,” said OSU coach Jim Tressel.

Curiously, some think Tressel’s conservatism will retard Pryor’s growth. But it was Tressel who force-fed Pryor into the starting lineup after three games. When the Buckeyes were in the fourth quarter of a see-saw game against Ohio University in the second week of last season, it was Tressel who would have played Pryor then and there, but for a punt return that broke the game open. Pryor assimilated the pared-down playbook quicker than Tressel expected. As Pryor grows more at ease with reading defenses, the coach will give him more responsibility.

Tressel, above all else, is adaptable. He buttoned up the offense when he had Craig Krenzel at quarterback. He groomed Troy Smith into a Heisman winner, although the season-ending injury of Oklahoma’s Adrian Peterson helped. As much as everyone raved about Smith as an athlete, he was a midget compared to Pryor.

Many fans remember 6-6, 252-pound Florida defensive end Derrick Harvey running Smith down on the play that set the tone for the championship game rout. Pryor would be much harder to catch and bully. He also seems better-grounded in his personal life, less susceptible to the overweening pride that went before Smith’s fall.

Pryor will have to be great if the Buckeyes are to beat USC and very good if they are to win at Penn State. But he has already been down, and that is where the climb to the top starts.

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