Note: This is the third in a three-part series previewing different aspects of Penn State’s 2024 season. Click here to read last week’s post.
Some time Sunday evening, a tweet will probably appear in your timeline from the account of James Franklin.
It will probably say this: “Game Week! Let’s do this TOGETHER Nittany Nation. We need EVERYONE – students, faculty, lettermen, alumni, & fans worldwide – locked in on being 1-0 against West Virginia Saturday!”
Likely sent between 6:30 and 7:30 p.m., it features a common refrain drilled that “everyone” Franklin mentions.
One and oh.
But if you like to follow what Franklin does and doesn’t say, that concept has been missing of late.
“1-0” or rather the idea of 1-0 has felt absent from this offseason for Franklin, now entering his 11th season as the head coach of Penn State football. The proof can be found in one quote but it’s a signal of a changing Franklin – who in the court of public opinion — is facing ever so much more pressure.
“A new era of college football with a playoff,” a reporter asked the coach at Penn State’s media day. “I wonder if that affects at all your approach to an overall season, and also having a tough road opener, how does that change or affect preparation?”
A few years ago, that question was skipped faster than “Hang On Sloopy” would be on the TouchTunes at the Phyrst.
After all, this is the man who spent much of his first few weeks on campus, shaking hands like some proverbial mayor – which one could make the case that he holds more power over Happy Valley than State College mayor Ezra Nanes.
Back then, Franklin had to sell the program. He had to sell the program to you, the fan. To those students, to those faculty, to those letterman and to those alumni all listed in the tweet. He also had to sell the program to prospective players – developing recruiting classes. That felt different than Bill O’Brien, who focused on making sure his players stuck together, and certainly different from Joe Paterno, who didn’t have to sell much for the last 30 years of his career.
So for Franklin, the slogans came out. They grabbed your attention from that introductory press conference. They also grabbed real estate on t-shirts, too. In Franklin’s early years, you could not walk from McLanahan’s to the Corner Room without being bombarded by the downtown shops selling “Dominate The State” shirts.
Then there was insert opponent, insert opponent, insert opponent. The repetition of an opponent’s name to get his team and his fan base focused on the upcoming mission became equally ubiquitous in Happy Valley.
Paired with “1-0,” those phrases seeped into Penn State’s other sports programs too. They echoed from the port-a-potties of lot 11 to cow fields and cornhole boards of lot 45. Even in 2024, at some point in September, you will utter the phrase “just got to be 1-0 today” to one of your tailgate buddies when they try to bring up that lingering Ohio State game in November.
During those 1-0 years, Franklin would bat away any question that related to an opponent or goal that wasn’t up next on the calendar. He was laser focused on the present. In fact, it went and still goes beyond what he would say. When kick times are announced by the Big Ten, unless it is the next game on the calendar — whether that be months or just days away — Penn State’s football accounts will not post about it. That post will come from the Penn State athletics accounts. It’s just another little quirk of control Franklin has on his program.
So at this year’s local media day, it seemed odd and notable when asked about the College Football Playoff that Franklin didn’t dismiss the question as he would have done in years prior.
Instead, he answered. And he expanded.
“I would say the first thing is the length of the season,” Franklin said. “I think you guys know, we have always talked about trying to create depth, was always important playing in a conference like the Big Ten.
“So that was philosophically something that we’ve always believed in but I think your point is a good one. It’s magnified now, right. You have the potential of 17 games.”
Here was Mr. 1-0. King “West Virginia, West Virginia, West Virginia” talking about the idea of Penn State playing a conference championship and four playoff games — meaning a trip to the national title game among them. It was a starkly different tone than other years if you caught that quote. Then again, the tone around Happy Valley is different now too. Franklin has felt the pressure coming his way with a program that has felt perpetually stuck at 10-2 — a previous marker of success but for most fans in the Keystone State, a frustrating wall. A week prior, he had somewhat bemoaned that notion, too, at Big Ten media days.
“They’re guys that embrace that we’re at a place like Penn State where we’ve been able to consistently, for the most part, win 10 or 11 games,” he said in Indianapolis. “But that’s not the expectation at Penn State. They chose Penn State just like I chose Penn State, to compete for championships, and we embrace that.
“But we are one of the few programs in the country where you can win 10 or 11 games and people are unhappy.”
At other times this offseason, he’s sounded like the now-elder statesman that the 52-year-old is in the college football world. In an interview of more than 25 minutes with Fox’s Joel Klatt, Franklin spent much of the conversation discussing the landscape of the sport and its recent changes. He offered thoughts on collective bargaining and NIL, politicking more like a presidential candidate and less like a local town officer. And most of all, he agreed that Penn State would have benefited from the playoff expansion in previous years, while refraining that the results weren’t good enough for some.
He continued on with his answer at Penn State’s media day.
“So how are you going to do that; I think that, coupled with some of the rule changes over the last couple years where you can play in four games, save your redshirt, but then you also get to be able to play in all of the postseason games and not burn your redshirt, I think that factors in to strategy in how we do these things.
“And then, you know, just making sure we are doing a really good job of rotating and playing guys for the fourth quarter, for late in the season, and now a playoff run, all those types of things.
“I guess to answer your question, it’s not really dissimilar to what we have done in the past. I just think it’s heightened if that makes sense.”
And now here he was explaining Penn State’s planning for approaching that “playoff run.” He was announcing that his process — the one that’s been a fabric to Penn State football — is ever so slightly evolving. Yes, he said it was “not really dissimilar” but it is. It was different than year one or two Franklin. That James never would have offered an answer like that. That James also didn’t have the experience or coaching maturity that this James has. This James also has more awareness too.
Franklin has always dropped easter eggs, and once the ones from this offseason have been cracked, it’s not impossible to think that Penn State’s attitude on the bigger picture is changing. It came through in that answer. It came through in that interview with Klatt. It’s been more prominent than ever before.
There are signs for it. There are signs against it. In a recent video posted on Instagram, you can see an empty trophy case sitting next to the most recent National Championship trophy. It’s been there for a few years – just like inside the tunnel of Beaver Stadium, you – or rather the players – see “1-0” in bold white italic font on an awning to the entrance of the field.
Those literal signs are there and may reappear here or there, but there’s some deviation in the philosophy that feels just noticeable enough to seem different, to make you wonder if 1-0 may be fading — that the big picture really is a bigger goal or that there’s no problem with attacking those goals.
Will any of that deviation have a direct outcome of the games and their results? Probably not. After all even if what’s said is different, they are just words. Words don’t win football games. Touchdowns, pivotal stops late and right coaching decisions at the right time do win football games.
Yet it’s in those words that the head coach seemingly is letting you know that he knows this. This offseason has been an acknowledgment that the fan base is hungrier than ever, that it – and he – wants a playoff berth now. That’s hard to ignore — even if he’s being sneaky about it.
Then again, there’s nothing sneaky about sending a public tweet out to 291,701 followers. Sunday will confirm that 1-0 the brand is still alive even if 1-0 the philosophy is not.
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