James could not beat Top 10 teams. Matt can't beat doormat Wiscy, 2-9 vs. PSU previous 11 matchups. The same Wiscy that lost 41-13 to Notre Dame.
BGJ (Big Game James) replaced with DMC (Door Matt Campbell)
- Thread starter The Song Remains the Same
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That's Wisconsin's first road win in 2 and 1/2 years! Fickell had an 11-17 record in b1g games at Wisconsin coming into the game! Just an embarrassing loss especially the way it unfolded and PSU just refused to take a win from a bad team who spotted them to a 17 point lead.
Yep, the offense was as inept as in the infamous 6-4 Iowa loss during The Dark Ages.
If Pitt wins, they'll say they beat Penn State in absentia. If VT wins, Penn State got rid of a Master coach.
After 16 hours with no one to stalk, the tsitsee emoji 
returns to pollute.
returns to pollute.
The moniker Big Game James (BGJ for short) is/was a sarcastic reference to ongoing epic Top 10 fails. BGJ had his share of losing to doormats, mostly in his first 2 years and obviously the 2 you reference.
Or MSU in 2017 and 2018, or Illinois in 2021, or Maryland and Nebraska in 2020, or Kentucky in the 2018 bowl game or Arkansas in the 2021 bowl game? I think that it’s funny that some think that Franklin only lost to teams like OSU, Michigan and Oregon.
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hmmmm...I think I see what you did there........I'd compliment your response, but that might have a quite deleterious effect on your fatalismWe still suck. ”The Song Remains The Same”.
Franklin lost to 0-4 ucla without coaches.
He lost to
Northwestern. So if we win this week is Campbell better.
He lost to
Northwestern. So if we win this week is Campbell better.
That's over an 11 year span. 5 or 6 bad games in 11 years. That's incredible. MC has 1 already in 4 games LOL. And we were one play away from the title game two years ago. Its insane that PK fired him after two bad weeks, and had NO PLAN after that.
Franklin also had us one play from the title game the year before.... so if MC gets there and then he can lose games like this
How far away from the title game were we last year?
He wasn't fired after two bad weeks
And he had a plan--attack the execution if you'd like but regarding Franklin had to go--and Franklin knows this
He's at Va Tech for a reason--if he was this elite coach you all claim he would have a MUCH bigger job right now
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Only took 11 years for Franklin to get there and he only got there because we got the best draw any team will ever get
Our draw was so laughably bad they altered the seeding moving forward.
Your bragging about beating Boise and SMU--think about it.
It wasn’t one play. In no way shape of form was it one play. Don’t kid yourself. He had a ridiculously easy path to play nd and lost.
Personally, I find a rush by some of our fanbase to slap a moniker like this on our new coach so quickly far more embarrassing than Saturday’s loss.
Is this who we want to be?
Franklin’s family were directly harassed last year.
Now we’re nicknaming our new coach after his first loss. Classy.
Let’s say Campbell ultimately DOESN’T work out. Who would want to come coach for a bunch of @ssholes like we’re being?
smfh
Is this who we want to be?
Franklin’s family were directly harassed last year.
Now we’re nicknaming our new coach after his first loss. Classy.
Let’s say Campbell ultimately DOESN’T work out. Who would want to come coach for a bunch of @ssholes like we’re being?
smfh
Small game Matt. Franklin couldn't beat Ohio State, Campbell can't beat Wisconsin!!! Franklin never lost to Wisconsin btw.
Oh Matt Campbell is a better in-game coach than James Franklin. He BLEW a 17-point lead AT HOME to an unranked 10-point underdog!!!! And he's nowhere near the recruiter Franklin is. Enjoy being Iowa State!! You spoiled Penn State fans deserve every loss!!!
You weren't happy with the second winningest coach in Penn State football history.......noooooo. Enjoy mediocrity!!!! Spoiled Penn State fans deserve every loss!!!!
Oh Matt Campbell is a better in-game coach than James Franklin. He BLEW a 17-point lead AT HOME to an unranked 10-point underdog!!!! And he's nowhere near the recruiter Franklin is. Enjoy being Iowa State!! You spoiled Penn State fans deserve every loss!!!
You weren't happy with the second winningest coach in Penn State football history.......noooooo. Enjoy mediocrity!!!! Spoiled Penn State fans deserve every loss!!!!
The lack of class and respect on this board with respect to a rebuild team that lost a fair amount of talent after 1 freaking loss is appalling. CMC will do well and has recognized the history and legacy of this program. Cut him and our players a break and quit your whining. Seems like too many of you never heard the word No growing up or haven’t learned how to cope when things go wrong.
1) In the era of 100% annual free-agency, there are no "rebuilds" grace periods. Everyone is in a rebuild every year.
2) The team wearing the PSU uniforms played like crap, and lost to a bad team on Saturday. It happens.
3) If people want to "vent", who is to say they aren't allowed to?
You mean after 10 out of 10 winning non-covid seasons with a trip to the National Semi-Finals the year before?? Losing to two teams by a grand total of six freakin points with a 3,000 mile, four time zone road trip thrown into the mix???
You’re kidding, right???
Campbell is playing with an Iowa State All Star team with full scholarship limits and enhanced redshirt benefits. James started under scholarship sanctions and ended the 2014 season with a Pinstripe Bowl win playing with 41 scholarship players after injuries and redshirts.
As soon as this schedule came out before James was fired, most felt this season was set up to be an easy Playoff run. Now, even you admitted in another post we will probably lose to Northwestern on Friday. We just freaking blew up an 11 year Program rebuild.
Congratulations on booing and “FIRE FRANKLIN” chanting your way back to square one.
Okay okay, you're correct, Drew threw a horrendous pick in the late moments of a final four game in which we outplayed Notre Dame. We dominated the first two playoff games no matter who they were against. Its funny how far our expectations have dropped already. I knew that we would become the new Nebraska, I'm just shocked it happened this quickly. This is a nightmare scenario playing out for the Franklin haters. There is a legit chance Penn State will win 5 or 6 games this year, and BGJ will take a team that won 3 games last year and have them in the playoffs.
I think why so many of us are upset, is because we witnessed a "lack of class and respect" given to JF who arguably did more that anyone in the history of PSU football to reach our ceiling. JF was booed out of State College and the AD joined in the fan club and fired him after TWO bad weeks of football. That is not classy nor respectful. This is just my point of view.
"We Are!" Want proof that a segment of the PSU fanbase is toxic. Reference the Youtube video of Matt Rhule's news conference the week after Franklin was fired. Saying the most vile things and then wondering why Franklin has never "thanked" the fanbase.
The fault for the perception of Campbell is clearly on the shoulders of Pat Kraft.
Promising "excellence at the highest level and a NC" from the next coach was a silly, stupid and fatal mistake. Campbell will need to build here, and it isn't a good atmosphere for that right now.
Campbell's fault is not game coaching. It is recruiting. Our team is currently Iowa State east. Since Iowa State plays in an inferior conference they get inferior players which we now have. You can't win in the Big Ten with Iowa State players. We are going to have to flush out the Iowa State players and then see how we do with Campbell's Big 10 recruits. We may do well. Remember that Joe went 5-5 in his first year. We are headed to 7-5 this year with the inferior Iowa State players. If we finish better than that, then Campbell is doing a great job with inferior talent.
Lots of us recognize the history and legacy of this program. That doesn't mean didly squat when the ball is kicked off.
Unrealistic expectations are at the core of how PSU judges its coaches. It's easy to over react when fans are fed a steady diet of fluff pieces about offices, shoe strings, culture, fit, football alumni, blue color, nice guy, finding diamonds in the rough, coaching them up....brilliant game management, we're gonna be the most physical team in America. People here swallowed it whole.
Football is a competitive sport. Your opponent works hard at winning too. All that other stuff keeps people employed.
We deserve better?
Kraft deserves credit for placing a bullseye on Campbell before he ever came here.
PSU is currently 6th in the conference (or 7th) in NIL money and recruiting is about the same. If Campbell wins 9 or 10 games this year, he's a good coach. I'm concerned that if he doesn't (and I've been screaming all summer) the recruiting and the portal talent won't improve and the schedule gets real.
When Pitt beats VT on Friday, I guess it will be because VT has a bunch of overrated and underachieving ex PSU players who contributed to a great 7-6 season in 2025, including a glorious 3-6 Big 10 record. Guess what, most of those players weren’t great Big 10 caliber players either or, if they were, then they were coached terribly..
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This is exactly the issue! How many of “our” ISU players would Indiana or Ohio S have even taken a cursory look at much less signed? If Campbell did not have personal relationship with his guys would they have been the players he targeted to rebuild PSU? There is a reason those guys were playing at ISU and not OSU. Reality is ISU was a mid tier Big 12 team under Campbell, and now the core of that team is the core at PSU.
Can you get it through your head that Campbell had to bring a lot of his ISU players just so that PSU actually could field a somewhat competitive team; he had no other choice? Instead of bashing these players, most of whom seem to be decent players, we should be thankful that they decided to come here. Otherwise, PSU would be playing with a bunch of MAC level players or worse and staring at a 2-10 or 3-8 season.
I understand the exigency aspect of it. But we have a bunch of MAC level players and 3-8 is a real possibility. Campbell was not prepared to go hard in the portal last year to upgrade, but he has to this year. His GM needs a coherent portal strategy to substantially upgrade to Big level players.
This bs about rebuild is hysterical - you would think Campbell is coaching for free and the players aren't being paid huge $$$ for that ridiculousness last week against a team/coach that was 5-11 in Road Games during his tenure at Wisconsin (and 10-17 in b1g play since taking over at Wisconsin). PSU is paying Campbell MORE than they paid Franklin and Campbell is paying his recruits MORE than than last year's team was paid. Campbell is paying Becht huge $$$ when he could have played Grunkenmeyer a whole lot less and Becht was beyond awful last week and he is . Campbell is paying Hansen huge $$$ and he looks like he should be playing DIII. Campbell is paying multiple D-lineman huge $$$ and they get zero upfield pressure on the QB.
Kraft having no choice but to fire Franklin the way he did is compete and utter hogwash. The only thing Kraft firing Franklin did was feed and satisfy Krafty The Clown's "who's the boss" baby-man ego - it certainly didn't help PSU in any way whatsoever and quite to the contrary, harmed PSU very significantly (for instance, had this dipshit done nothing, PSU would have come into this year with a far better roster for the same amount of $$$ than we saw last week). Even if Kraft wanted to replace Franklin, he would have been in much better shape to put out feelers... do his due diligence, have his targets and make his move at the end of the year (again, a name coach can bring players with him). But the way Kraft went about this was motivated by his own personal vendetta against Franklin NOT PSU's BEST INTERESTS!
Kraft is primarily responsible for the absolute crap-show we saw last Saturday where we have PAID-UP for a coach AND players that are a clear downgrade to what was here prior to Krafty The Clown's amatuer-hour nonsense. How does Krafty's ridiculous diatribe about having brought a coach in that will win b1g and National Championships look now?!?! LMAO Kraft should have been fired Sunday morning. He has made PSU into a laughingstock with his handling of the football team (a Professional Football team) - he is Barney Fife shooting himself in the foot while running his mouth about showing us how you win Championships. Just ridiculous.
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