On Sunday, the unfortunate yet fully expected news out of Penn State arrived when head football coach James Franklin was fired.
This season, Franklin couldn’t escape his critics who have long berated him for failing to win the big games at Penn St (he was 4-21 against top-10 opponents).
While last season ended with a loss to Notre Dame in the semi-final game of the College Football Playoffs, the best finish in his entire head coaching career, this season brought more frustration to the overall Penn State community.
2025 began with three straight wins for the no.3 ranked Nittany Lions. Then came the first big test of the year as no.6 Oregon rolled into town for a primetime national showdown.
After a boring three quarters, the fourth quarter saw a back and forth affair that pushed the game into overtime.
The first overtime resulted in a 24-24 tie and fans had hopes that the second overtime would produce the big win that had eluded Franklin’s teams for so long.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case as Oregon prevailed with a 30-24 2OT win.
While he received some flack for the loss, it wasn’t as damaging as the next two losses which saw Penn St fall to a winless UCLA, 42-37, followed by another humiliating loss at home to also-unranked Northwestern, 22-21.
The three straight losses, coupled with the embarrassing quality of the latter two, sealed Franklin’s fate.
While many will rejoice over his firing, it’s important not to forget what James Franklin did during his tenure in Happy Valley.
Franklin arrived at Penn State in 2014 after three successful seasons at Vanderbilt where he had a record of 24-15 and went 2-1 in bowl games.
At the time, Penn St was still reeling from the sexual abuse scandal involving long-time Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky that boiled over nationally in 2012 when Sandusky was sentenced to 30 to 60 years in prison.
