The Penn State Nittany Lions’ teaching search stays one thing of a thriller, and it doesn’t seem that they’re prone to land any of their dream candidates.
Some round college football imagine the Nittany Lions could look to the likes of Duke’s Manny Diaz and Syracuse’s Fran Brown, according to Bruce Feldman and Ralph D. Russo of The Athletic. Each coaches have ties to Penn State athletic director Pat Kraft, although neither is having an important season and actually justifies getting such an enormous job.
Manny Diaz and Fran Brown are acquainted, however disappointing
Diaz is in his second season as head coach of the Duke Blue Devils. Duke is 4-3 after going 9-4 final season. Diaz was additionally the Miami Hurricanes head coach from 2019 to 2021, and he went 21-5 and by no means received a bowl sport. However he was additionally defensive coordinator and linebackers coach at Penn State from 2022 to 2023. Brown is in his second season as head coach of the Syracuse Orange. Brown’s Orange workforce is 3-5 this season after going 10-3 in 2024. He held a number of titles at Temple from 2012 to 2016 and in 2019. Kraft was the AD at Temple from 2013 to 2020.
Extra realistically, hypothesis has centered round Louisville’s Jeff Brohm and Vanderbilt’s Clark Lea. Lea, nevertheless, could also be tough to pry away from his present job, and Vanderbilt could also be planning to provide him a contract extension.
Brohm has Massive Ten expertise, having beforehand coached at Purdue. Louisville is his alma mater, nevertheless, and getting him to depart is perhaps a problem. Lea is in the identical state of affairs at Vanderbilt, which he has shortly constructed right into a nationally related program.
There had been rumors linking the Nittany Lions to Nebraska coach Matt Rhule, however Rhule agreed to a contract extension and is off the board now.
Realistically, Penn State may wrestle to land a top-tier candidate. Two SEC jobs are open in LSU and Florida, and each will most likely be seen as extra enticing. The names that have popped up before will not be essentially that inspiring, both.
