This is the third in a three-part series previewing the 2025 Penn State football season.
If there’s a space that I’d model my dream mancave after, it’s the one belonging to Brian Schmitt, father of my best friend since the ninth grade – Jennah.
It’s a menagerie of treasures of Pittsburgh Steelers from yesteryear surrounding a full (and well-stocked) bar running down the left side. Over to the right is a bathroom that has a urinal in it. The fact that Brian was able to convince Mary Ann, (or as I’ve always called her) Mama Schmitt, years ago to install that is a testament to how strong their marriage is.
There’s a welcoming couch that’s been the forum for many stories. There is everything you could ask for to make you feel right at home.
As far as basements go, it was the basement that will always be my gold standard for my current or any future homes.
But it’s the wall that greets you right when you come down the steps that completes it. On that wall at the bottom of the steps is a gallery wall of Penn State photos, autographs and one very memorable magazine cover to my youth.
Captured on that Sports Illustrated from August of 1999, a Hulk-like figure in a Penn State No. 11 jersey menaces in front of a white background, crunching a bar that reads “1999 COLLEGE FOOTBALL PREVIEW.”
On the left a set of headlines that reads “A Paterno Inferno?” in burnt orange font. Below that “Lavar Arrington Fires Up No. 1 Penn State.”
That magazine cover is – among the many pieces – the one that’s always been of my envy. Or rather, what completes the Schmitt family mancave. It’s a time-stamped artifact of a formative year of college football for me.
That magazine cover is also the last time there were expectations like the ones Penn State is facing in 2025.
“Let’s also be honest. It’s a great conversation, but who really cares about preseason ranking? They mean nothing,” James Franklin said in the closing thoughts about expectations at the Big Ten Media Days back in July. “It’s a good argument to have and everybody has fun with it, but the only rankings that matter are the ones that happen at the end of the season, and that’s what we’re concerned about. The only way we’ll do that is by handling our business today.”
Of course, he’s right.
There is no edition of Sports Illustrated from January 2000 featuring Arrington lifting a national championship trophy over his head hanging on the Schmitt wall.
Those great expectations that came into the 1999 season promptly ended when Dan Nystrom split the uprights inside of Beaver Stadium as the clock ran out and Minnesota won 24-23.
Of course, that’s my first memory of Penn State football.
Being inside Beaver Stadium, crying that Penn State lost while sitting on my mom’s lap.
I am not certain that I fully remember that I understood the consequences of what I’d just seen. But as a fan, I remember it. I remember the sky. I remember that day. I remember the feeling. I remember all of it – even as a five-year-old.
And in the time that I’ve grown up and in the time that Penn State has had 25 seasons in between that feeling and those expectations, it has only been in retrospect or rather in the moment where it felt like Penn State could get over the collective spot it’s been stuck in since before I was born.
2005 in some ways was a surprise. 2016 went from almost a fluke to a moment to a wave but was stopped short – albeit not on Penn State’s accord at the end. 2017, 2018 and 2019 had whiffs of and then whiffed on potential – and even last year, there was confidence but there weren’t bona fide national championship hopes the way that Penn State fans have been buzzing about for the last 226 or so days.
In a matter-of-fact manner, Franklin helped build those expectations – both in his coaching ability and in his words. He has helped claw Penn State from the days of thud tackling at practice to its – as he’s boasted several times this offseason – deepest offensive line maybe ever.
In between then and now, there have been painful misses and messages of “elite” that seemingly provide haze over the more boisterous parts of the fan base like a methane fog lifting over a cow field in Happy Valley.
To his credit, everything that Franklin has done between the day he took over and now has put Penn State squarely in this moment of real expectations. It was only accelerated when he – along with Pat Kraft – went out and spent the most money ever on an assistant coach in college football in Jim Knowles.
Coming with Knowles were the expectations have only intensified for what could be. Rightfully so. He was the guy who just helped lead the reigning national champions to said national championship.
Elsewhere, there has been “alignment” ad nauseam with NIL, wishfully and still unprovenly closing the hole in one piece of Penn State’s roster it didn’t have last season when it mattered most.
The quarterback that Franklin recruited who has faced an immense amount of pressure to be THE quarterback for Franklin is back. He’s paired with two running backs who have a legitimate crack at becoming Penn State’s No. 1 and No. 2 all-time leading rushers. Right now, throw a proverbial cornhole bag in the direction of Happy Valley and you’ll hit some reason for all of these expectations.
Every move that Franklin has made has crashed into this avalanche that’s rolling into 2025 12-game saga and whatever comes after that.
“The reality is, when it comes to the Lasch Football Building or when it comes to local, these are always the expectations at Penn State,” Franklin said just before his thoughts on preseason rankings. “We had what a lot of people would consider a really good season last year. We were a game away from playing for the National Championship, and you could actually make the argument a drive away from playing for the National Championship, but it didn’t feel that way, right? Because the expectations at Penn State are really high.”
While he’s correct that, yes, this is Penn State and yes there are always national championship expectations, for the first time in a long time, this feels doesn’t feel like just another year.
The 2025 season will be Penn State’s most intense under Franklin, regardless of what happens. Everything that happens from the time the ball is kicked by Gabe Nwosu around 3:45 p.m. on the 30th of August to whenever the journey ends will be under this microscope of hope and scrutiny for and by fans, coordinators, players, administrators and even the head coach himself. For better and for worse regardless of your opinion on him, Franklin’s done that to himself. He’s guided Penn State to this moment.
But it’s time and it’s fine to have those expectations after every one of those moves that’s gotten Penn State to where it is now in 2025.
It’s been long overdue for Penn Staters to feel how they feel right now before this season starts.
That’s why Brian Schmitt’s mancave has been on my mind. That’s why that magazine cover has been on my mind.
Ironically, Sports Illustrated does not offer the same level of gravitas anymore the way it did for a high schooler until about 2018, but like that nostalgia of hanging out in the Schmitt basement, that 1999 cover is a time capsule of an important moment.
It’s a physical marker of a moment when there were real hopes for those passionate about the blue and white.
Of course, that publication and its weekly glossy release is nearly extinct. But other places like The Athletic, ESPN, On3 and even the trusty Associated Press’s poll are fueling expectations for Penn State fans now.
And so too is Franklin.
It’s a pivotal moment for Penn State football. 2025 will be a significant year — one way or another.
But how it’s remembered and how it’s symbolized by what hangs on the wall in the Schmitt family basement remains to be seen.
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