UNIFORMLY THE SAME

STATE COLLEGE - For the first time since 1929, there is no member of the Penn State football coaching staff who played for the Nittany Lions, and that includes two holdovers from the Joe Paterno regime, defensive line coach Larry Johnson (Elizabeth City State) and linebackers coach Ron Vanderlinden (Albion College).

Incorporating the best of what was, and what will be, is the challenge confronting new coach Bill O'Brien, who knows something of the traditions put into place by his late, great predecessor, Paterno, but apparently not everything.

O'Brien, the offensive coordinator for the New England Patriots, will continue splitting his time between the Patriots, who take on the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLVI on Feb. 5 in Indianapolis, and Penn State, where he won't take over on a full-time basis until the day after the Pats are finished playing.

"It's important for us to learn the history of Penn State football and to embrace it," O'Brien said of what he and seven new assistant coaches need to learn in the weeks ahead.

Toward that end, O'Brien assured Penn State faithful that one of the school's most obvious traditions - its plain but distinctive uniforms - won't be getting some fancy makeover.

"We are not changing the uniform," O'Brien stressed. "When you put the television on and you see Penn State, you know it's Penn State because, one, it's a tough, smart football team and, two, because of the uniforms - no name on the back of the jerseys, the black shoes, the helmets. That, to me, is what Penn State is."

Less familiar to O'Brien, obviously, was Paterno's long-standing rule prohibiting facial hair on players. When O'Brien held a team meeting at Penn State a couple of days ago, some players looked as if they belonged in an NHL playoff locker room.

"Guys are just excited that they don't have to be clean-cut and clean-shaved every day, so they're just letting things go," starting quarterback Matt McGloin, who was sporting a close-cropped red beard, told ESPN.com. "Coach Paterno's rule was to make sure you have a nice shave, hair not too long. Obviously I respect that and I liked that when I first got here. But . . . college kids tend to let themselves go."

In putting his own stamp on a program Paterno oversaw as head coach for 46 years, it will be interesting to see how much he borrows from JoePa and how much of himself gets blended into the program moving forward. But O'Brien professes not to be worried. He had what he describes as a "brief but meaningful" telephone conversation with Paterno about 10 days ago, at which point he said "it was clear that we shared a lot of the same beliefs. I was thrilled to have the chance to speak to him."

So the new-look Nits will continue to wear those old-school unis, but the unadorned white helmets could be placed on heads with whiskered chins. And will O'Brien's playbook contain the fullback belly series plays that Paterno was so fond of? (No decision yet.) Will his revamped staff cast a wider recruiting net that was the one thrown by Paterno's assistants, who concentrated mainly on prospects from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, New England, Ohio, Michigan, Virginia, Maryland, South Carolina and the metropolitan Washington area? (Yes.)

O'Brien said the Lions will attempt to gain a toehold in the talent-rich Southeast, primarily in Florida and Georgia, where such Big Ten Conference schools as Michigan and Ohio State regularly stock up on skill-position players with faster times in the 40-yard dash than your average cheetah.

"It's not easy because there's a lot of competition," he said of the recruiting free-for-all in the targeted states. "All the big schools are in there. What we've got to do is do a great job of quickly whittling our list down to the guys we feel are the best fit for Penn State."

And the ones that would be the best fit, he noted, are the ones who can meet Penn State's rigorous academic standards. Maintaining a high graduation rate is importand to O'Brien, who said he got 29 of 30 questions right on the standard NCAA recruiting test when he was an offensive coordinator at Duke 5 years ago.

"I think if I was a Penn State grad," said O'Brien, who played at Brown University, Paterno's alma mater, "I would have gotten 30 out of 30."