James Franklin weekly press conference: Penn State vs. Northwestern

On3 imageby:Thomas Frank Carr09/27/22

ThomasFrankCarr

Week five of the college football season began on Tuesday when Penn State head coach James Franklin met with the media to discuss his team’s upcoming game against Big Ten West foe Northwestern. Before moving on to the Wildcats, Franklin recapped last week’s win against Central Michigan and discussed areas of growth and areas of improvement that his team needs to make before they make the plunge into the Big Ten schedule for the season. Subscribe to Blue White Illustrated on YouTube so you don’t miss Franklin’s comments leading up to the game!

Penn State vs. Northwestern James Franklin press conference

Franklin started with a recap of the Central Michigan game before previewing the upcoming opponent, the Northwestern Wildcats. From there, he took questions from the assembled media for roughly 45 minutes on a range of topics.

The afternoon’s first and most prevalent topic was the Penn State defensive backs, who broke up another 13 passes on Saturday, extending their nation-leading production by 20 more than the next closest team. Franklin discussed Joey Porter Jr, and Kalen King and whether or not his team has placed an extra emphasis on recruiting that position in recent recruiting classes.

Several questions also arose about playing time for young Penn State players, including freshman quarterback Drew Allar, who has participated in each game this season. Now that the team is entirely in Big Ten play, will that continue? Franklin discusses the challenges of playing players too early in a game and the risk of keeping starters in later than needed.

While he didn’t answer the question, Franklin addressed the situation with Smith Vilbert, who hasn’t played for the Nittany Lions but is participating in practice as a practice squad player. He said he’d comment on it at a later date but had to discuss the situation with Vilbert first.

Other status updates included left guard Hunter Nourzad, who didn’t play last week against Central Michigan. Franklin also explained the plan to continue rotating a depth player at that position even with Nourzad sidelined.

Press conference rundown

00:00 Video starts
00:51 The importance of defensive backs
03:12 The value of Joey Porter Jr. at corner
05:25 Playing time plan for Drew Allar this upcoming weekend
07:15 Kalen King’s level of play
11:30 Status of Smith Vilbert
12:55 Barney Amor and Penn State’s strategy with transfer portal punters
17:35 Alcohol sales at Beaver Stadium
18:45 Penn State’s kicker decision process
20:10 Sean Clifford evaluation
22:34 Left guard rotation and update on Hunter Nourzad
23:57 Penn State defensive ends vs. Peter Skoronski
25:45 Manny Diaz evaluation through four games
27:43 Reason for change in playing quarterback depth
31:20 How much does Franklin keep in touch with former assistants?
34:19 How has Penn State gotten so many different players to the quarterback?

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