Penn State salvages embarrassing head-coaching search with strong Matt Campbell hire

Under James Franklin's watch, Penn State had developed into a consistent top-15 team that was always in contention for a playoff spot, and finally made the field in 2024 and went as far as the national semifinal. It was pretty much two plays away from playing for the national championship, setting championship-or-bust expectations for the 2025 season.

But Penn State's inability to win the big games and beat the top teams in the country, combined with a series of brutal upset losses to UCLA and Northwestern, led to the Nittany Lions firing Franklin early in this season and sending the program into a chaotic two-month head-coaching search. 

As embarrassing as it looked at times, the only thing that matters for Penn State is it may have actually found itself one heck of a football coach. Campbell has had success at both his head-coaching stops, putting competitive programs on the field at both Toledo and Iowa State, working his way into the top 25 at both stops. That is not an easy thing to do at those programs. 

The question now will be whether or not that can translate over to the Big Ten and the expectations that come with coaching at Penn State.

After all, he is walking into a program that just fired an extremely successful coach because the team was good instead of great, and less than one calendar year after playing in the semifinals. Sure, you can argue that Franklin was given a 12-year run with wildly safe job security, but the fact remains that was a quick change at the first sign of real trouble. 

One of the biggest obstacles Campbell will have to overcome early in his tenure is the fact that Penn State's recruiting class this year was pretty much a complete zero due to the coaching search. A few years ago, that might have been problematic, but the transfer portal and NIL opens up avenues for him to bring in his own established players.

He also retaining Penn State interim coach Terry Smith on his staff. Smith is a Penn State lifer and highly respected within the program and community, and he is a big win for Campbell to retain. 

If Penn State had gone right to Campbell and hired him two weeks ago, it probably would have been a hire that was greeted with universal applause. It will still be greeted with applause, but it was just a very round-about way of getting to a good result.