The time for Penn State to be elite is now here. That’s according to no less than an authority than Penn State’s defensive coordinator, Ivy League grad and PA native Jim Knowles, who is now 195 days into the job.
“Our charge,” Knowles said during last Saturday’s media day presser, “is to be great now.”
Later, chatting one-on-one with Knowles as he sat on a bench by his lonesome in Holuba Hall, I told him I liked his one-liner. He gave me a thin smile. Then he dropped a pair of “elites” on me.
Knowles gets it. The timing to compete for, let alone win, a college football national championship can be limited. He saw it last year at Ohio State as the Buckeyes’ defensive coordinator and the mastermind of the nation’s No. 1 defense. Ohio State may have lost to Michigan, but it won the natty. A week later, Knowles was Penn State’s second-highest paid employee.
So, what about that urgency, I asked Knowles, and your admonition to “be great now?” Knowles is a straight-shooter. Really bright, soft-spoken, a tad homey. When he thinks, he’s looking down. When he’s ready with an answer, he looks at you right in the eye. Old school.
“It is what it is,” he said. “Defense here has always been good, if not great. So, it’s not like I’m coming in and taking over a unit that wasn’t productive.”
Knowles paused. He knew what he was saying and where, especially important from whence he just came.
“So, now, you’re trying to go from great to elite,” Knowles said.
To me, it was 2018 redux.
“That’s the change,” Knowles added. “That’s something we have to do right now. If you’re taking over a unit that was not very productive, you can gradually ramp it up. But Coach [James] Franklin’s defense has always been a priority and has performed well. To move it to the next level, the elite level, you have to have a lot of urgency about it.”
Urgency indeed. And in deed? Now, it’s 2025. Franklin’s 12th season at Penn State. Knowles’ first. Andy Kotelnicki’s second. Pat Kraft’s fourth. And the last for the likes of Drew Allar, DDS, Nick and Fat.
GOOD, GREAT, ELITE
Elite talk in these parts is nothing new. Franklin said the same thing 2,507 days ago, minutes after Penn State, ninth-ranked at the time, lost 27-26 to No. 4 Ohio State on Sept. 29, 2018 in Beaver Stadium. (Knowles was the D-coordinator at Oklahoma State at the time.)
Franklin’s elite elucidation that day: “We’ve gone from an average football team to a good football team to a great football team, and we’ve worked really hard to do those things. But we’re not an elite football team yet. And as hard as we have worked to go from average to good, from good to great, the work that it’s going to take to get to an elite program is going be just as hard as the ground and the distance that we’ve already traveled…
“Right now, we’re comfortable being great, and I’m going to make sure that everybody in our program, including myself, is very uncomfortable. Because you only grow in life when you’re uncomfortable. So, we are going to break through and become an elite program by doing all the little things…
“It’s my job as the head coach; I am ultimately responsible for all of it. And I will find a way — we will find a way — and with all the support of everybody in this community, everybody on this campus…”
Now, it appears that James Geoffrey Franklin is a man of his word.
Now, there is a palpable sense of urgency for that prophecy to be fulfilled, fueled by years of Franklin pushing the envelope, pushing his players, pushing the Penn State decision-makers into some kind of rim-rod straight alignment (as CJF has told us, time and time and time again). A fleet of great players are back. Franklin says his personnel — coaches, players, staff — are, as Drake might say, the best he’s ever had.
When Franklin was a head coach at Vanderbilt and into his early days at Penn State, the PowerPoint he shared at coaches’ clinics was full of catchphrases, bromides and motivational sayings worthy of a psych major. This is one he always shared — just one, long run-on word occupying the entire screen: “Opportunityisnowhere.”
Then, Franklin would say to a roomful of eager coaches, looking to build a program and their name, clicker in hand: “You can read that one of two ways: Either opportunity is nowhere. Or, opportunity is now here.”
Penn State football’s Opportunity for No. 1 is now here.
Now, Penn State is ranked No. 3 in the preseason Coaches poll and will find out on Monday where it ranks in the inaugural 2025 Associated Press rankings. Franklin b(r)ought not one, not two, but three seasoned wide receivers from the portal. After putting out a very-public APB for a great (elite?) linebacker immediately after the Blue-White Game, Amare Campbell ditched Bill Belichick and came to Penn State. And the team in Lasch collectively came through with enough cash to retain a great roster.
KNOWLES KNOWS
Now, great things are expected. Elite things. Which Franklin understands. The window will slam shut, at the latest on Jan. 19 at the CFP championship game in Miami. His quarterback, running backs, star edge-rushers, a bunch of O-lineman and likely a key assistant or three will be gone by Groundhog Day…which also happens to be Franklin’s birthday.
Last Saturday, I fed Knowles — the 3.1 Million Dollar Man — another question, couching it in a compliment.
Me: “You uniquely know what a national championship team looks like in college football these days. You’re the one guy here who so recently knows the real answer to this question: Do you see that potential for a national championship here now?”
Knowles: “Yes. Yes. The simple answer is yes. I see it here — from the players, from the support staff. All the things that people don’t see behind the scenes. The coaching staff that we have is the best. I see it all in place here. And that’s a big deal. Nutrition, strength training, the academics, NIL, the support from the administration. So, there’s everything here to get it done.”
MORE ON PSU: PENN STATE URGENCY
Here’s what other key Penn State football leaders are saying about the urgency of winning it all in 2025:
Athletic director Pat Kraft, back in February, a few weeks after Penn State lost 27-24 to Notre Dame in the CFP semifinals: “You don’t come to Penn State willy-nilly and say, ‘Let’s see what happens.’ We’re here to win national championships, and we’re going to do it the right way. Yeah, I’m committed. It takes everybody. …When it comes to football, we’re close. We’re going to keep going and keep going and keep going until we get to where we want to be.”
Quarterback Drew Allar, quite possibly a first-round NFL Draft pick last April and almost assuredly one in 2026: “I think we definitely have that sense of urgency. We can’t wait for anything. We have to go after it now. That’s kind of how we practice.”
Offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki, back for a second season after being a prime candidate for a head coaching job last December: “There’s not really urgency; there’s new motivation. If there’s any change in urgency, there’s an urgency to find new ways to foster and teach these older guys. There’s motivation to be better every year. But when you’re interacting with different people [transfers] and older players who are back, you can’t keep coaching the same way.
“Take [sixth-year center] Nick Dawkins. He’s mature, he’s one of the best leaders I’ve been around and he knows what he’s doing. [Offensive line coach Phil Trautwein] knows that Nick knows. Nick’s heard all the Trautisms, if you will. But Traut does a good job of keep pushing Nick. Nick is at grad level already. We need to get Nick to the Ph.D. level.
“With Nick, and the older guys, it requires more detail, more thought, more intentionality. It requires us to think outside the box. And that’s what we’ve done.”
