James Franklin is out at Penn State. The school fired their longtime head coach on Sunday, less than 24 hours after a 22-21 home loss to Northwestern all but ended whatever remote chance the preseason No 2 team had of reaching the College Football Playoff.
Terry Smith will serve as the interim head coach for the rest of the season for the Nittany Lions (3-3, 0-3 Big Ten), who began the year with hopes of winning the national title only to have those hopes evaporate by early October amid a string of losses, each one more stinging than the last.
Penn State, who reached the CFP semifinals 10 months ago, fell at home to Oregon in overtime in late September. A road loss at previously winless UCLA followed. The final straw came on Saturday at Beaver Stadium, where the Nittany Lions let Northwestern escape with a victory and lost quarterback Drew Allar to injury for the rest of the season.
Franklin went 104-45 during his 11-plus seasons at Penn State. Yet the Nittany Lions often stumbled against top-tier opponents, going 4-21 against teams ranked in the top 10 during his tenure.
There was hope this fall might be the one when Penn State would finally break through. Yet after three easy wins during a light non-conference schedule, the Nittany Lions crumbled.
Athletic director Pat Kraft said the school owes Franklin – who is due nearly $50m in a buyout of his contract, which went through to 2031 – an “enormous amount of gratitude” for leading the Nittany Lions back to relevance but felt it was time to make a change.
“We hold our athletics programs to the highest of standards, and we believe this is the right moment for new leadership at the helm of our football program to advance us toward Big Ten and national championships,” Kraft said.
The move will cost Penn State at a time the athletic department has committed to a $700m renovation to Beaver Stadium. The project is expected to be completed by 2027.
Former athletic director Sandy Barbour signed Franklin to a 10-year contract extension worth up to $85m in 2021. According to terms of the deal, Penn State will have to pay Franklin’s base salary of $500,000, supplemental pay of $6.5m and insurance loan of $1m until 2031.
It’s a steep price, but one the university appears willing to pay to find a coach who can complete the climb to a national title.
“We have the best college football fans in America, a rich tradition of excellence, significant investments in our program, compete in the best conference in college sports and have a state-of-the-art renovated stadium on the horizon,” Kraft said. “I am confident in our future and in our ability to attract elite candidates to lead our program.”
