Kyle Golik
Penn State Writer
No matter where you turn this week, it seems everyone has been busy writing James Franklin’s obituary as Penn State’s head coach.
“It’s time to move on,” they say.
Others compare it to Andy Reid’s divorce from Philadelphia — a mutual parting meant to let both sides flourish.
I don’t buy it.
Who I buy into is James Franklin.
Those calling for change, believing the grass is greener, often underestimate how difficult it is to win at the highest level of college football.
Penn State fans rightfully lament the record against Ohio State, but they often fail to grasp just how historic the Urban Meyer and Ryan Day eras have been.
Meyer won 85.3% of his games — the highest winning percentage for any coach with 100 or more wins since World War II.
Day has won 75 of his first 85 games, giving him a .882 winning percentage — narrowly higher than the legendary Knute Rockne’s .881 mark.
Ohio State’s dominance also extends to recruiting. From 2014 through 2025, the Buckeyes’ average class ranking sits at third nationally, behind only Alabama and Georgia. Penn State’s average ranking? 18th.
If you use Penn State as a benchmark, the Nittany Lions sit among a cluster of programs that include Tennessee and Miami above them, and South Carolina and Ole Miss below.
And yet, Penn State has outperformed all four of those programs over that same stretch.
Make no mistake — what happened in the Rose Bowl was inexcusable, one of the program’s worst losses in recent memory. But upsets happen — even to legends.
In 1991, Joe Paterno’s No. 5 Nittany Lions lost 21–10 at USC — a Trojans team that would finish just 3–8. Penn State still finished 11–2 and ranked third nationally.
In 1995, Penn State carried the nation’s longest winning streak into Beaver Stadium against a 4–5–2 Wisconsin team. Barry Alvarez’s Badgers pulled off the upset behind a bruising run game and stout defense.
Paterno’s longest streak of defeating unranked opponents was 33 games. Franklin’s streak was 34 before UCLA snapped it last weekend.
When Bill O’Brien left for the NFL in 2013, he warned that 2014 and 2015 would be “rough times” due to scholarship reductions from NCAA sanctions.
It was Franklin, not O’Brien, who weathered that storm — guiding Penn State through the lean years with just 65 scholarship players and a bench of walk-ons, keeping the program afloat until the 2016 breakthrough.
After COVID gutted his 2020 roster — with opt-outs, injuries, and turnover that Urban Meyer called “something I’ve never seen before” — Franklin turned an 0–5 team into one that won its final four games.
He then rebuilt the roster from the ground up, producing Penn State’s best three-year run since 1980–82, capped by a program-record 13-win season last year.
Yes, this 2025 team looks overrated right now, but it still has time — and talent — to make a statement.
With a veteran core likely headed to the 2026 NFL Draft, who better than Franklin to rebuild and reload? He’s earned that trust.
Fans who dream of finding “the next Kirby Smart” should remember: even Smart has an Alabama problem. He’s 1–7 against the Tide. That 2022 national title only carries so much currency before Georgia fans start wondering if Kalen DeBoer will become their new tormentor.
Penn State has everything in place: a strong athletic director in Dr. Pat Kraft, institutional alignment, and a coach who has proven he can win, recruit, and stabilize a blue-blood program under enormous pressure.
Losing big games hurts. But letting go of a proven winner out of frustration would be far worse.
James Franklin isn’t finished — and neither is Penn State.
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Adam Hicks
Author
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