James Franklin Penn State spring practice press conference
Penn State spring practice is underway. Despite the show and wind, head coach James Franklin and his program began the first of 15 practices on Tuesday, setting the stage for the 2023 football season. Before those practices kicked off, Franklin spoke with the media early Tuesday afternoon to set the stage for what he wanted to accomplish this season. Check out his full comments in our rebroadcast of his press conference. If you haven’t yet, subscribe to Blue White Illustrated on YouTube and enable notifications, so you don’t miss any live content from BWI.
The top story coming into Tuesday’s press conference was Franklin’s decision to hire former Penn State defensive end, graduate assistant, and analyst Deion Barnes as the next defensive line coach.
Franklin started out by highlighting the new Penn State players on campus and his eagerness to see what they can do.
“Obviously excited to watch the 11 new high school early enrollees and the transfers.”
Franklin starts with new hires
But most of Franklin’s opening comments discussed the new hires that happened this offseason.
“Some hires that you guys are aware of; Marques Hagans. I’ve been really impressed with how he’s been able to come in and build trust not only with the players but also the staff.”
Torrence Brown is now back with us as a defensive assistant in Deon’s old position. He was part of our first recruiting class, and it’s cool to have him back.”
Franklin also spoke at length about the hiring process for Penn State and how he went about the search. Why did it take longer than it normally does to replace former assistant John Scott Jr? It was intentionally long, according to Franklin,
“The length of it; I wanted to be able to get it done before spring break. I want the players to hear it first from me. So when we didn’t get it done before spring break, there was no rush. I wanted it in front of the players.
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But we interviewed a lot of guys. So we also use it as a way to interview guys to see if they’re a fit down the road.
Ultimately, I had to hire the right person.”
So what made Barnes the right fit? He has a lot of qualities, which Franklin detailed, but he also has institutional knowledge that they don’t have to replace with a new face in the building.
“He understands our defense already; he understands the culture. When you hire a coach from the outside, you might get other things, but he has to learn all of those things.”
Penn State quarterback competition
Finally, Franklin gave a preview of how the spring quarterback competition will work for Penn State The team is breaking in a new starter and the competition between Drew Allar and Beau Pribula will be legitimate, according to the rep count.
“We want to keep it as even as possible, and we have it structured it that way, specifically between Beau and Drew. Really making sure we protect those guys’ reps as much as we possibly can. There is a situation where Beau gets more reps by the end of spring with some of the things we want to do with him to take advantage of his athleticism.”
Check out the video for his full comments.
