You mean the coach that left the "sinking ship" but his son is still on the football team at PSU? While I think Franklin was disappointed that Shoop left to go to Tennessee, it was always understood that he wanted to be a head coach sooner than later. Tennessee offers him a quicker route to that gig. If there had been bad blood between Franklin and Shoop, his son would have transferred instead of staying on the football team. There were also other factors like Shoop's wife loving Tennessee and never moving to State College--same with Herb Hand's family. Happy wife, happy life sometimes. You have to figure a coach's life can take a toll on a family when they're moving around every 4/5 years trying to get to the next level.
Penn State recruiting question
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You mean the coach that left the "sinking ship" but his son is still on the football team at PSU? While I think Franklin was disappointed that Shoop left to go to Tennessee, it was always understood that he wanted to be a head coach sooner than later. Tennessee offers him a quicker route to that gig. If there had been bad blood between Franklin and Shoop, his son would have transferred instead of staying on the football team. There were also other factors like Shoop's wife loving Tennessee and never moving to State College--same with Herb Hand's family. Happy wife, happy life sometimes. You have to figure a coach's life can take a toll on a family when they're moving around every 4/5 years trying to get to the next level.
Though I can't picture a scenario right now where that happens--it would be great. This might be the only year UM can get OSU and MSU though.
For this one, I'm rooting for a scoreless tie that is called in 2OT for lightning strikes near the stadium.
Is this really necessary? It's a decent thread and you are coming off as unnecessarily hostile. Like many on this board I am not a Penn St fan, but no need for hostility vs fun trash talking. BTW we are the last to be throwing stones against PSU. We've done squat against them. It will change one Ash gets a couple of strong classes together, but that may be if Franklin is there. Rhule might be a different story.
no doubt about that....Carroo's a beast. he landed in a good spot too, with the Bengals.
edit: my bad, he's with the Dolphins. it was Tyler Boyd who landed a good stop with the Bengals.
oh well...Adam Gase will hopefully turn that offense around
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PSU has always fielded good defenses and this current defensive staff is very good so I don't see that changing anytime soon. Austin Johnson, Anthony Zettel, and Carl Nassib didn't play under the Paterno regime at all even though they were recruited by them and were not starters under O'Brien. It's Sean Spencer the current D-line coach who developed those guys and all three were drafted.
Well, there are no more than a handful of 2012 players left on either roster, so not really looking at them for the team's prospects in 2016 and beyond.
So, from 2013-2016, Tennessee brought in 45 four- and five-star players to your 36.
If you go by 247 values over that the last four classes, you guys brought in 87 players with an average rating of 87.43 while Tennessee brought in 108 players with an average rating of 88.36. Tennessee really has you beat on quantity over quality... though that does mitigate the risk of highly rated players who don't pan out, for sure. Other than just # of recruits (which you had fewer of in 2013 because of sanctions), you guys seem to have done as well as Tennessee over that stretch. (It seems Tennessee had to have cut essentially an entire recruiting class over that time, too, to get down to 85 scholarship players.)
ok...color me surprised. I didn't know there was such disdain for Michigan....especially over PSU. I'll take your word for it
Wait, wasn't it the Dolphins?
Speaking of receivers, where is Blacknall on the depth chart?
Isn't Michigan starting a new QB-O'Korn from Houston? He was a dynamo against RU in 2013, throwing 5 TDs against our swiss cheese defense. Don't know what happened to him and how he wound up at Michigan.
I still don't get the whole Michigan being our arch nemesis bit. I think people just hate Harbaugh more than the school but he rubs everyone the wrong way.
I can't name a single school in the Big Ten East whose fans like Michigan, besides Michigan fans. No one has anything nice to say. More so now.
We haven't beat Penn State since the 1980's, until we beat them again, the hatred is mostly one sided.
Our two games against Maryland were two of the most exciting games in all of CFB, but both fanbases are still in the honeymoon period, knowing full well we helped each get into the Big Ten. So we can't really bring ourselves to hate them too much just yet. But so far it has been a super fun series.
I can't name a single school in the Big Ten East whose fans like Michigan, besides Michigan fans. No one has anything nice to say. More so now.
We haven't beat Penn State since the 1980's, until we beat them again, the hatred is mostly one sided.
Our two games against Maryland were two of the most exciting games in all of CFB, but both fanbases are still in the honeymoon period, knowing full well we helped each get into the Big Ten. So we can't really bring ourselves to hate them too much just yet. But so far it has been a super fun series.
Going back to the hypothesis that Hack's struggles would deter blue-chip recruits from committing to Franklin, Scout just released its top 10 for the 2018 class. The #2 player, as in #2 in the entire country, is DE Micah Parsons, who is already committed to PSU. And back to this cycle, 5-star CB Lamont Wade is scheduled to attend the Lasch Bash in a few weeks, for what will be I think his seventh visit to PSU this year. It's fair to criticize Franklin's lack of marquee wins to this point, and I agree that at some point recruiting will suffer if the program doesn't show signs that it is ready to make the leap out of mediocrity, but nobody should be pushing the panic button just yet.
yeah, he went to the Dolphins...I edited my post. my bad. it was T Boyd who went to the Bengals. both of those receives were quite similar.
in a 3 WR set....Blacknall's starting. he's made a big push in the off-season....so much so that they moved D Hamilton to the slot....in addition to Eugene Lewis transferring to Oklahoma.
I think you'll see PSU in three-WR sets the majority of the time, with Godwin and Blacknall starting outside, and Hamilton in the slot. It'll be interesting to see if either Juwan Johnson and/or Irvin Charles force their way onto the field, though, especially in the red zone.
State Penn's schedule is NOT tough. That is the kind of bullshit I expect from your weakling head coach. Wow.
Whether the schedule is "tough" or "relatively tough" (which is what I said) is splitting hairs. It's certainly not easy. Michigan, Ohio State, Iowa and Michigan State combined to go 46-8 last season and all finished in the top 12 of the AP poll. PSU has already been installed as a nine-point underdog at Pitt, and Temple won 10 games last season.
There is no reason why PSU can't go at least 7-5 against this schedule, but I stand by my comment that, given our own situation - rookie QB, questionable OL, new scheme, limited depth in front seven - that it is absolutely not an easy schedule.
RU v. PA St schedule comparison by final 2015 Sagarin rank, shared opponents in bold.
RU:
3 @ OSU
9 vs. Michigan
17 @ MSU
22 vs. Iowa
25 @ Washington
48 vs. PA St
61 vs. Illinois
65 vs. Indiana
67 @ Minnesota
85 @ Maryland
110 vs. New Mexico
242 vs. Howard
PA St:
3 vs. OSU
9 @ Michigan
17 vs. MSU
22 vs. Iowa
36 @ Pitt
47 vs. Temple
65 @ Indiana
67 vs. Minnesota
85 vs. Maryland
98 @ Purdue
102 @Rutgers
161 vs. Kent State
RU:
3 @ OSU
9 vs. Michigan
17 @ MSU
22 vs. Iowa
25 @ Washington
48 vs. PA St
61 vs. Illinois
65 vs. Indiana
67 @ Minnesota
85 @ Maryland
110 vs. New Mexico
242 vs. Howard
PA St:
3 vs. OSU
9 @ Michigan
17 vs. MSU
22 vs. Iowa
36 @ Pitt
47 vs. Temple
65 @ Indiana
67 vs. Minnesota
85 vs. Maryland
98 @ Purdue
102 @Rutgers
161 vs. Kent State
I believe ESPN called PSU's schedule the 51st toughest, and Rutgers the 55th. But it was never my intention to say whose schedule was tougher.
Those Sagarin ratings seem to suggest the opposite would be true.:cool2:
Yeah, they give you guys a lot of credit for scheduling Kent State as your patsy instead of an FCS team. Unless Dri Archer returns and your QB throws 6 picks, I think it's safe to say you're going to win that one.
So, looking at the other 11 games on the schedule beyond those two and assuming them both as wins, I'd say the rest of our schedule stacks up a bit tougher than yours does.
First let's look at the 7 shared games. You get 5 of them at home... we get 3 of them at home. They're the same teams, but you have a slightly easier road getting two more at home.
Breaking down the remaining 4 games...
Big Ten games.... we get Illinois and you, and you get Purdue and us. Going off of last year's results, you definitely were the stronger team (though this season has a lot of unknowns).... and Illinois is a tougher opponent than Purdue. Definitely a bit tougher sledding on our side.
OOC games... Pitt and Temple vs. Washington and New Mexico. I think we have the best and worst of that bunch, while you have two in between. We have the better P5 school (on the road to start the season on the west coast), and you have the better G5 school (by a pretty fair margin). We probably have less of a chance of beating Washington than you do Pitt, but we have more of a chance of beating NM than you do Temple. This is largely a wash... but you might have a slightly more difficult road given that Temple beat you by 17 last year.
So, aside from the patsy game, I think our schedule is a bit stronger.... include the patsy game and yours looks better on paper, but only if one reasonably thinks that you may lose to Kent State to open the season (and don't get me wrong, I'll be rooting hard for the Golden Flashes, but they've got a snowball's chance).
What's with all the Rhule talk? I don't think Franklin goes this year, maybe next if there's no improvement. This is still not to the level of the NFL, you really have to give a college coach four years to get his own kids in unless he completely tanks the team or infuriates the donors. That said, let's say six wins this year, 5 wins next and Franklin is shown the door. Why would Penn State for a single moment even consider Matt Rhule? This is nothing against Matt Rhule, he's a very good coach and has really managed to recruit well to Temple. Does that translate to success at one of the truly high profile jobs in college football? I don't know. I do know Miami and Boston College thought so. Golden flamed out badly and Addazio's house is on fire as we speak. Penn State financially is on a par with Ohio State, Bama, LSU, and any of the other big programs. They can hire anyone, money is not an issue. They hired Bill O'Brien away from the New England Patriots. If they hired a coach from a mid-major, I'd be shocked.
Thanks for the breakdown, but again, my initial point was never to compare the two schedules.
The initial schedule breakdown was informational, not directed at you or putting any value judgements. People can't really say you have an easy schedule while calling ours hard, or vice versa.... they're pretty close.
You have higher expectations, though, for sure, given that it's Franklin's third year with three consecutive top 25 classes and we're in a complete overhaul after the Flood era. Less than 7 wins for you guys would be pretty bad, while more than 5 for us would be pretty good... just based on our relative places of our programs this year.
Fair enough. Totally agree that the expectations are different for PSU and RU this season. Because of the recruiting differential of late, there's no question PSU has more talent throughout its roster. It will be interesting to see how a presumably better coached RU team compared with the Flood regime will fare this season while dealing with some clear roster limitations.
Look at this. A civilized football discussion!!! In June even. Bravo ladies and gentleman.
Franklin basically has 2 years to get to a Major Bowl, if not it's probably move on to what's his name....the current Temple coach.
I think Penn State strongly considers Rhule when Franklin leaves. He's one of them but I don't like they are so run oriented.
Maybe. Rhule's name makes sense now given the season Temple just had, but it's important to remember that we have no idea what the coaching landscape might look like come December 2017, which would be the absolute soonest any changes would be made.
