James Franklin returned to Primanti Bros. tonight for the Penn State Coaches Show. Below is a paraphrased recap of what he had to say...
Home field advantage….
Only thing he likes more than Christmas is a White Out. Never had home field advantage in his career. Makes a huge impact in so many different ways – restaurants, hotels and the team for game day. Tough for opponents to communicate. Intimidating. Coaches/players/recruits feed off it. Impacts other sports. A lot of programs out there that’d die to have 70,000 or 80,000, and PSU has been over 102,000 every game and Saturday has the chance to break the record.
Balancing family/job...
Really challenging. With his wife when they first met, he was up front about the job. She knows nothing else. She thinks this job is normal. He told her it’s not a career/job. It’s a lifestyle. Hit her with the Jedi mind trick. No balance. For him to say there’s balance between job and family, he doesn’t have it. That’s why every moment he can, he spends time with his kids or includes his family with his job. Has coach guilt because he’s so passionate about both. Has the best wife in the world who does a great job raising his kids. There are advantages. You give and take. He makes an argument that raising kids in a college town like Happy Valley with 125 big brothers who are great role models who emphasize academics/community there are advantages as well. Embraces the whole thing. Battles for time with kids/wife, but it’s not easy. Coach Pry’s kids were at practice today. Tonight, JF will have the OL over for dinner, which his wife doesn’t look forward to. Eighteen 300-pounders with a couple guys who are over 350, so they’ll clean out the pantry.
Question come from Malik Golden about Michigan’s defense…
Very talented. Hurst is as good as a DL as they’ve seen all year long. Some people have him ranked as the No. 1 player in all of football. Don Brown, Michigan’s DC, does a great job. He’s overly aggressive with press coverage on the outside and a lot of blitz/pressure. UM is No. 1 in the country in total defense. PSU is No. 1 in scoring defense. Tremendous challenge. Malik will love it because it’s his type of game.
Franklin takes a minute to give a shoutout to Malik…
Malik saw it all in his PSU career – coaching changes, adversity, ups and downs. He bought into how JF was doing it. His senior year he really had an unbelievable season and is with the Steelers now doing well. Great student/ambassador. He’ll go on to be successful in whatever he chooses to do after football.
Basing game plan around a Michigan player…
Maurice Hurst has been a focus, who they’d call a game-wrecker. Rushing game is starting to pick up and then on special teams, they have Quinn Nordin, who was committed to PSU early in the process, as people who follow recruiting know. He’s really kicking well, 85-percent of his kicks. Two 55-yarders. He’s a talented guy as well. Will have to be prepared, but the most is Maurice Hurst, No. 73.
After bye week…
Sees more energy, more focus. It’s slight but practice has an overall better feel. Practicing well with a lot of confidence/enthusiasm/leadership. Took advantage of this bye week as well as they ever have.
Week of preparation…
Sunday was a light practice, which went well. Monday, coaches game planned and players had off, but McSorley and Cabinda met with the offense/defense, respectively. Tuesday practice was sharp, bc they shifted some periods back to Sunday. Wednesday was good and today was too, without watching film. Walk-through tomorrow. Moorhead, Pry and Huff have a good plan. Sometimes a bye week gives you too much time on your hands but they handled it well.
Working with DC Brown – help or hindrance?
People talk about growing the grass long to slow the teams down, but it slows both teams down. Same thing here. He knows Brown better than others but Brown also knows JF better. Brown believes in what he does and doesn’t change. Solve problems with aggression. Everything he does is aggressive. When he was at Boston College he had the No. 1 defense. At Michigan he’s doing it again and recruiting well. Michigan has been good on offense and special teams, but Don has made them special.
Gameplan based on home field/White Out…
Doesn’t affect PSU. Affects Michigan’s offense. Crowd takes pride in how many times can they get them to jump offsides or get a delay of game. What also happens is on third down when Michigan is in the shotgun, it’s hard to handle. They’ll have to use a silence cadence or the OG will signal the snap and that way PSU's DL can tee-off on that. A couple years ago PSU led the nation in sacks and Carl Nassib led the nation individually and that’s the stadium helping out. Crowd can help there and in the red zone. Dramatic impact. Can’t do it on their own. Need all 110,000 plus the team to be on board. It does create challenges on the defense bc you’re trying to make it hard on the offense. The offense will make a check and then the defense will make a check and they’re flapping their arms and showing off signals. Then you watch the tape and you study the signals and you can find tendencies. Prefers not to use hand signals but sometimes have no choice. Would prefer to have color cards on sidelines will signal plays in. Different coaches will wear different colored hats and that aligns with which coach is signaling in the plays on said drive.
Home field advantage….
Only thing he likes more than Christmas is a White Out. Never had home field advantage in his career. Makes a huge impact in so many different ways – restaurants, hotels and the team for game day. Tough for opponents to communicate. Intimidating. Coaches/players/recruits feed off it. Impacts other sports. A lot of programs out there that’d die to have 70,000 or 80,000, and PSU has been over 102,000 every game and Saturday has the chance to break the record.
Balancing family/job...
Really challenging. With his wife when they first met, he was up front about the job. She knows nothing else. She thinks this job is normal. He told her it’s not a career/job. It’s a lifestyle. Hit her with the Jedi mind trick. No balance. For him to say there’s balance between job and family, he doesn’t have it. That’s why every moment he can, he spends time with his kids or includes his family with his job. Has coach guilt because he’s so passionate about both. Has the best wife in the world who does a great job raising his kids. There are advantages. You give and take. He makes an argument that raising kids in a college town like Happy Valley with 125 big brothers who are great role models who emphasize academics/community there are advantages as well. Embraces the whole thing. Battles for time with kids/wife, but it’s not easy. Coach Pry’s kids were at practice today. Tonight, JF will have the OL over for dinner, which his wife doesn’t look forward to. Eighteen 300-pounders with a couple guys who are over 350, so they’ll clean out the pantry.
Question come from Malik Golden about Michigan’s defense…
Very talented. Hurst is as good as a DL as they’ve seen all year long. Some people have him ranked as the No. 1 player in all of football. Don Brown, Michigan’s DC, does a great job. He’s overly aggressive with press coverage on the outside and a lot of blitz/pressure. UM is No. 1 in the country in total defense. PSU is No. 1 in scoring defense. Tremendous challenge. Malik will love it because it’s his type of game.
Franklin takes a minute to give a shoutout to Malik…
Malik saw it all in his PSU career – coaching changes, adversity, ups and downs. He bought into how JF was doing it. His senior year he really had an unbelievable season and is with the Steelers now doing well. Great student/ambassador. He’ll go on to be successful in whatever he chooses to do after football.
Basing game plan around a Michigan player…
Maurice Hurst has been a focus, who they’d call a game-wrecker. Rushing game is starting to pick up and then on special teams, they have Quinn Nordin, who was committed to PSU early in the process, as people who follow recruiting know. He’s really kicking well, 85-percent of his kicks. Two 55-yarders. He’s a talented guy as well. Will have to be prepared, but the most is Maurice Hurst, No. 73.
After bye week…
Sees more energy, more focus. It’s slight but practice has an overall better feel. Practicing well with a lot of confidence/enthusiasm/leadership. Took advantage of this bye week as well as they ever have.
Week of preparation…
Sunday was a light practice, which went well. Monday, coaches game planned and players had off, but McSorley and Cabinda met with the offense/defense, respectively. Tuesday practice was sharp, bc they shifted some periods back to Sunday. Wednesday was good and today was too, without watching film. Walk-through tomorrow. Moorhead, Pry and Huff have a good plan. Sometimes a bye week gives you too much time on your hands but they handled it well.
Working with DC Brown – help or hindrance?
People talk about growing the grass long to slow the teams down, but it slows both teams down. Same thing here. He knows Brown better than others but Brown also knows JF better. Brown believes in what he does and doesn’t change. Solve problems with aggression. Everything he does is aggressive. When he was at Boston College he had the No. 1 defense. At Michigan he’s doing it again and recruiting well. Michigan has been good on offense and special teams, but Don has made them special.
Gameplan based on home field/White Out…
Doesn’t affect PSU. Affects Michigan’s offense. Crowd takes pride in how many times can they get them to jump offsides or get a delay of game. What also happens is on third down when Michigan is in the shotgun, it’s hard to handle. They’ll have to use a silence cadence or the OG will signal the snap and that way PSU's DL can tee-off on that. A couple years ago PSU led the nation in sacks and Carl Nassib led the nation individually and that’s the stadium helping out. Crowd can help there and in the red zone. Dramatic impact. Can’t do it on their own. Need all 110,000 plus the team to be on board. It does create challenges on the defense bc you’re trying to make it hard on the offense. The offense will make a check and then the defense will make a check and they’re flapping their arms and showing off signals. Then you watch the tape and you study the signals and you can find tendencies. Prefers not to use hand signals but sometimes have no choice. Would prefer to have color cards on sidelines will signal plays in. Different coaches will wear different colored hats and that aligns with which coach is signaling in the plays on said drive.
