by Kyle Golik
If you are a fan of Penn State, stop me if you have heard this one: James Frankin has fired his offensive coordinator.
Consider the following of the Mike Yurcich era at Penn State; he had a rocky road to start his tenure in 2021 as Penn State did not have the offensive line or running backs to complement quarterback Sean Clifford. During that season, Penn State lost Clifford to injury, and the offense never got started.
Things seemed to blossom in the 2022 season. Outside of the Northwestern and Michigan games, Penn State had over 400 yards of total offense, with Michigan being the only team that outgained Penn State in offense last season.
Carrying over to the 2023 season, Penn State had the nation’s longest streak of 30 or more points scored in a game, a consecutive streak that would reach 13 consecutive games, with it only happening two other times in Big Ten history with 1993-1994 Penn State and 2014-2015 Ohio State Buckeyes.
Even with the lack of explosive plays, Penn State is in the Top 15 scoring offenses in the nation and is behind Oregon for the fewest turnovers in the country, but is 102nd in the nation in yards per play and dead last in the nation (130th) a percentage of plays that gain at least 20 yards
More good comes with more bad. With Drew Allar having an impressive 21 touchdowns to only two turnovers committed (1 interception, 1 fumble), yet the Nittany Lions pass offense ranks just 90th in the nation.
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Something you don’t expect having a five-star quarterback in the backfield.
How this program got from having guys like Godwin, Hamler and Dotson to where it is now is baffling.
Recruiting? Development? Poor player evaluation? Going after the wrong guys?
We knew all along the WR situation could be a problem. It's been a disaster. https://t.co/kdUTbTutkW— Cory Giger (@CoryGiger) November 13, 2023
When you have a dynamic running back duo in Kaytron Allen and Nicholas Singleton, you expect a repeat of last year’s dominant performance: a mixture of big plays and success on the ground.
While the Nittany Lions are averaging 172.3 rushing yards per game, good for 46th nationally, Yurcich’s scheme hasn’t figured out how to get both backs going, as Nicholas Singleton has had his seven games this season with 50 or fewer rushing yards. That’s something you don’t expect from a player who finished with over 1,000 yards a season ago, averaging nearly seven yards per carry.
“We thank Mike for his contributions over the last three years but feel it is in our program’s best interest to make a change at this time. We wish him and his family nothing but the best in the future,” Franklin said Sunday upon news of Yurcich’s release.
With running backs coach Ja’Juan Seider and tight ends coach Ty Howle sharing play-calling duties, they became the seventh group in Franklin’s 10 seasons at Penn State to coordinate an offense.
Franklin’s offensive coordinator history include:
- John Donovan (2014-2015)
- Joe Moorhead (2016-2017)
- Ricky Rahne (2017-2019)
- Tyler Bowen (2019 Cotton Bowl)
- Kirk Ciarrocca (2020)
- Mike Yurcich (2021-2023)
- Seider and Howle (2023-?)
Penn State insiders almost universally agree that the only offensive coordinator who was given any sort of autonomy over the offense was Moorhead. And that was the only period that you could describe the offense as elite. They finished in the top 10 in scoring in 2017, led by All-American Saquon Barkley.
When you look at when Franklin’s coordinators went awry, the offense has been handcuffed by Franklin running a variant of the spread that doesn’t work. Each of those offenses has looked exactly like what we have seen before, especially against Michigan.
The biggest problem with Penn State is they are a program that does not have an offensive identity. They are built like Ohio State: they run a spread attack and live off of numbers in various reads the quarterbacks have to make. The difference is that Ohio State has better athletes on the offensive line and wide receiver. They also typically have a decisive edge at quarterback, but at least at this point in time, I would say that Allar and Kyle McCord are effectively equal.
When you play a team like Michigan, their greatest athletes aren’t on the perimeter or at quarterback. The offensive line is their greatest asset in the pro-style attack the Wolverines utilize. There is a reason they are the two-time defending Joe Moore Award-winning unit.
I feel like there was some kind of understanding that if they didn’t beat Michigan, Yurcich would be gone. Cuz this play makes a whole lot more sense then, a middle finger salute for his last play call lol pic.twitter.com/8LTqBIQQhr
— PSU Everything (@PSU_Strong) November 13, 2023
Add in the running back duo of Donovan Edwards and Blake Corum, with a quarterback in JJ McCarthy who can make all the throws, and it just spelled doom for Penn State. Don’t look at McCarthy’s 60 yards, as he had a poor game; 7 for 8 passing does that.
Penn State didn’t have the front seven to stop Michigan’s ground game that went off for 227 yards. It was just another day of Michigan beating Penn State.
Allar seems to not have the pieces around him on the perimeter. He has arguably the nation’s best tight end unit, as Penn State leads the country with 12 receiving touchdowns by tight ends and is the only team with two tight ends with four or more receiving touchdowns this year.
The wide receivers, beyond KeAndre Lambert-Smith, have been suspect at best and when you look at the regression in the ground game, it doesn’t help Allar at all. Franklin pushed the blame on Yurcich during the Michigan postgame press conference when he said, “We’ve got to do a better job of calling a game to allow our quarterback to get into rhythm.”
It seems after a decade, Franklin cannot figure out how to beat the big boys in the Big Ten. When you consider the amount of talent he has already wasted, it looks like he might be adding more elite talent to a list of players he couldn’t navigate Penn State to a championship.
Franklin’s failure to identify the right offensive coordinator has held Penn State back, and until Franklin can figure out what he wants to be offensively, maybe the Nittany Lions can then realize its potential by winning a championship and eliminating the stigma the only certainties in life are death, taxes, and James Franklin losing the big game.
