Penn State Coaching Search: Josh Pate outlines potential candidates for Nittany Lions to still consider

For all the coaching searches that have already ended in hires this past week, there’s still one high-profile search ongoing at Penn State. Now, after nearly two months and with that situation getting more serious by the day, Josh Pate still doesn’t know who they’re going to hire in Happy Valley.

Pate discussed the latest regarding the Nittany Lions’ coaching search during his live appearance on ‘Get Up’ on Thursday. There isn’t much, though, considering the current state of things in that process, with Pate wondering where the search even is. He suggested two names who were, as recently as this season, working in the NFL.

“I think there are a couple of different searches happening up there. I mean, I think you’ve got Pat Kraft’s search. I think you’ve got maybe Board of Trustees members that are kind of tired of what’s happening,” Pate said. “The names being circulated now are really incredible. You hear like a Brian Daboll, maybe even a Jeff Hafley.”

That said, Pate really wonders about how this is going right now for Penn State. He thinks, while the Nittany Lions’ fan base may be holding on to hope that there’s something big happening behind the scenes, they may just be figuring it out as they go at this point. It’s also now, in hindsight, maybe making things even more questionable for Penn State to have fired James Franklin back in October.

“I don’t think they know where they are. Candidly, they’ve been wandering out in the back parking lot for quite a while when it comes to this search,” Pate said. “When you fired James Franklin, it’s okay if we don’t know who’s available. You’ve got to know, or have about a 90% certainty, of who’s available to you, or you don’t make a move on a guy who quite literally had you on the doorstep of the national championship game eight calendar months before that. They just kind of took the plane off, and then said we’ll figure out the landing gear in the air, and they haven’t figured it out.”

Could Penn State have a candidate right now and just not announced it? Don’t bank on that.

“No,” Pate said. “That is the hope. Like, if you’re logging on to maybe a Penn State message board, which I’ve lived on them the past few weeks – I don’t recommend it, but I’ve lived on them. They want to make themselves believe, hey, there’s still a grand master plan here. There is no plan. This is Michael Scott in The Office when they’re bankrupt. There is no plan. We’re just trying to figure it out. Someone pulled the ripcord, and nothing comes out of the backpack.”

It’s been nearly eight weeks since the Nittany Lions’ job came open, and almost a week now since their regular season ended. Yet, while several other jobs have been available and have since been taken in that time, the Nittany Lions still don’t have someone, which says a lot to Pate about where they are right now in University Park.