Breaking more than a year of silence, Joe Paterno’s widow said he was a “moral, disciplined” man whose reputation has been unfairly trashed by a probe of the Jerry Sandusky child-sex-abuse scandal.

Sue Paterno wrote former Penn State players yesterday, saying she was “shocked” by former FBI director Louis Freeh’s “extraordinary attack on Joe’s character and integrity. I did not recognize the man Mr. Freeh described.”