Orlando, Fla. ? While Larry Johnson clamored for the ball, Ronnie Brown kept getting it.

Brown scored on a 17-yard touchdown run with 2:19 left and outplayed the Heisman Trophy finalist as No. 19 Auburn beat No. 10 Penn State 13-9 Wednesday in the Capital One Bowl.

The final tally: Brown 184 yards, Johnson just 72.

Johnson, who ran for 2,015 regular-season yards, couldn’t break a long one among his 20 carries in his final Penn State game. The Nittany Lions (9-4) fell to 1-4 when he failed to reach 100 yards.

Johnson groused that the offense was “trying to be too cute” instead of just giving it to him.

“If we’d have done that, maybe the score would be reversed,” he said.

Maybe not, the Tigers said.

“All week, the TV and the media were just talking about seeing how far over 200 he’s going to get,” Auburn defensive end Reggie Torbor said of Johnson. “Like we’re a joke. We feed off that. The more they talk, the better we get.”

Penn State quarterback Zach Mills winces as he is hit by Auburn's Reggie Torbor during the first half of Wednesday's Capital One Bowl at the Florida Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Fla. The Tigers beat the Nittany Lions, 13-9.

Auburn linebacker Mark Brown said Johnson was on the sidelines begging for the ball.

“We heard him a couple of times after he made a run telling the coach he could do that all day — just give the ball to him,” Brown said.

Instead, Ronnie Brown kept getting chances.

Brown ran 37 times and scored twice as the Tigers (9-4) won a bowl game for the first time since 1998. Brown, voted the game’s MVP, was eager to prove himself against Johnson.

“Personally, that gave me a lot of motivation to be going up against someone like that, a Heisman candidate with so many skills,” the sophomore said. “And for us to be an underdog, that kind of gave us a lift as a team.”

The win was vindicating for the Tigers.

“We just came together and said, ‘They’re not going to get into the end zone,”‘ linebacker Dontarrious Thomas said. “As long as they kept getting field goals, we knew our offense was finally going to break one into the end zone.”

Penn State’s four losses came by a total of 20 points, as coach Joe Paterno failed to pad his NCAA record 20 bowl wins after a two-year bowl absence.

The Tigers beat their third Top-10 opponent of the season.

Brown passed the 1,000-yard mark despite starting only five games.

“The thing about a game like this is you hope someone has a good day,” PSU coach Joe Paterno said. “Larry didn’t have a good game, Zach (Mills, QB) didn’t have a good game. They did a great job covering Bryant Johnson. It was one of those days — what am I going to tell you?”