Dan Lanning legit turned the “whiteout” Nittany Lions fans into one sad bunch by the end of the game at Beaver Stadium. In an instant classic, the No. 2 Oregon Ducks beat No. 7 Penn State 30-24 in double overtime and silenced 111,015 fans. That is the highest form of disrespect to those who had spent hours messing with the Ducks’ families before kickoff. Most coaches would flinch at that kind of environment, maybe even lose their edge. Lanning? It only sharpened his focus.

Despite Penn State fans “flipping off his wife” as Oregon’s buses pulled in, Dan Lanning didn’t walk away rattled or bitter. He actually admired the chaos and stayed classy doing that. “The atmosphere you recognize the minute you drive in,” he said on Bussin’ With The Boys. “I think we’re rolling in a bunch of buses, and my wife sent me a picture yesterday. She’s got all these fans flipping her off on the bus. They’re kicking the bus. You don’t know what kind of fuel that is for a visiting team, how fun that is to be a part of.” How can that be fun when people are hostile towards your family? Lanning understands that fanbases sometimes take things too far in their frenzy.

As the away side were entering the stadium people were banging on their bus. It took the visiting team several minutes to enter through the RVs and tailgates. Coach told even his family loved it, “It’s super impressive. They had a great time. They were engaged the entire time. It was a really elite atmosphere the entire game. One of the better ones I’ve been in, for sure.” Lanning’s family is just built different at this point.

It was a window into Lanning’s mentality, isn’t it? What some would see as disrespect, he flips into motivation. The payoff came in the most dramatic fashion possible. After Oregon safety Dillon Thieneman soared for the game-ending interception on Penn State’s first snap of the 2OT, Dan Lanning and his players burst onto the field in a blur of helmets and hugs. He found Franklin, shook his hand quickly, then spun back toward his sideline and roared with all of the adrenaline he had stored up. Moments later, he was nearly in tears as he spoke with the SI broadcast crew, his voice cracking when the conversation turned to what the win meant for his roster.

“I’m just really proud for our players that they got to experience that,” Lanning said. “They worked really hard. There’s a ton of emotion in a game like that. You put your all, you work incredible hours. Our players worked so hard. So for them to be able to celebrate a moment like that… For them to walk out of this with a ‘W’ is really big.”

When the dust finally settled, Lanning spotted his wife, Sauphia, and their young son, Titan, near the edge of the chaos. The three sprinted toward each other and met in a long, emotional embrace, an almost cinematic reversal of what had happened before the game. Penn State’s own fans even turned on their head coach. As the Ducks built a 17-3 lead early in the fourth quarter, chants of “Fire Franklin!” echoed across the same stands that had been intimidating hours earlier.

Penn St.’s ‘favorite’ track is now also Dan Lanning’s

The Ducks coach didn’t just survive the white-out at Beaver Stadium, he made it his habitat. Lanning also executed a perfectly timed jab. Everyone in Happy Valley knows the soundtrack that plays when Penn State’s defense takes the field. Sheck Wes’s “Mo Bamba” rattles through the stadium, designed to get into the opponent’s head. On Saturday night, though, it backfired in the most delicious way possible.

After Thieneman sealed Oregon’s win with his clutch catch, Dan Lanning hopped on Instagram and posted the play, set to none other than “Mo Bamba.” His caption? “My new favorite song.” Pure gold. That’s how you take a tradition and turn it on its head.

Now sitting at 5-0, Oregon heads back west to face Fernando Mendoza and undefeated Indiana. The Ducks will need every advantage available to them to beat out Curt Cignetti. But after seeing what they did at Penn State, the sky is the ceiling for this Ducks squad.