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Penn State Could Do a Lot Worse than Matt Campbell
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Latest on the Penn State coaching search:
Campbell is a good coach. Iowa State was nothing before he got there. Zero. Zip. Nada. They won eight combined games in the three seasons before he arrived, then improved to 8-5 right out of the gates with a Liberty Bowl win over Memphis. ISU has won eight or more games in five of Campbell’s ten seasons with the Cyclones, which includes bowl wins over Oregon and Miami. He’s 72-55 there and is the 3x Big 12 Coach of the Year.
The one knock against Campbell is, get this – he doesn’t win the big game. He lost the 2020 and 2024 Big 12 title games to Oklahoma and Arizona State. They lost to BYU at home this season and ranked Texas and Kansas at home in 2023. He is 16-27 all time against ranked teams with four wins against the AP top 10.
On the flipside, we all know what James Franklin’s record was in big games.
The context here is that Iowa State is Iowa State. You hit a ceiling there just like every Big 12 team not named Texas or Oklahoma (before they jumped ship). You don’t have Blue Blood resources or much history to lean on. ISU didn’t have a single player drafted between 2014 and 2019, then Campbell put guys like David Montgomery, Brock Purdy, Breece Hall, and Will McDonald into the NFL.
Campbell wouldn’t be the most exciting hire of all time, but Penn State could do a lot worse. He took a total zero of a program and made it a legitimate one.
Kevin has been writing about Philadelphia sports since 2009. He spent seven years in the CBS 3 sports department and started with the Union during the team's 2010 inaugural season. He went to the academic powerhouses of Boyertown High School and West Virginia University. email - k.kinkead@sportradar.com