The search that so many wanted is here in a way no one wanted it, a way few could have possibly imagined it.
Penn State is in the market for a head football coach for the first time since 1965, and you could argue that it really wasn’t even then; Joe Paterno, the outspoken young assistant from Brooklyn, had more or less been the coach-in-waiting for several years when Rip Engle stepped down in December of that year.
Forty-six years, 410 wins and one unfathomable scandal later, the university is searching for Paterno’s full-time successor.
And the list of potential replacements for the man who led the Nittany Lions to national prominence is not what one might call overwhelming.
The Urban Meyer dream died earlier this week, when the former Florida coach, who has had success wherever he’s been and won two national titles in Gainesville, ended his one-year absence from the coaching ranks and signed with Ohio State. The question that might eat at Penn State fans forever is would Meyer have wound up at Penn State had the Jerry Sandusky scandal not torn its way through campus or was he destined for Columbus either way?
Meyer was the star candidate; arguably no one else in the college game today has that kind of aura. His star shines brightly enough that you have to squint to see the next wave.
Chris Petersen? Terrific record, fun style. But can he win and recruit at a high level in a BCS conference?
Dan Mullen? He displayed offensive wizardry as one of Meyer’s top assistants at Florida but was his relative lack of success at Mississippi State a result of the bulk of elite teams in his conference or an indictment of his recruiting and overall leadership abilities?
Can Tim Murphy make the jump from the Ivy League to the Big Ten? Have recruits in the Northeast heard of James Franklin? Is Mike London building enough at Virginia to pass up a chance to head north?
Will Mike Munchak leave the NFL after just one season, a pretty successful first season at that, as a head coach?
The point of this exercise is not to illustrate that there are questions about each candidate — there are in every coaching search, whether that coach is replacing Paterno or Ron Zook. The point is that all the Penn State fans who had wanted Paterno to step down after this season or seasons prior to it should be asking themselves right now — Are these the guys we wanted to replace him with?
This is not to say that each of the candidates listed above could not do a fine job, or even get the Nittany Lions to the point where they’re consistently challenging Meyer and the Buckeyes for conference titles and, in doing so, putting themselves in the national championship picture on a consistent basis.
But, there is so much working against whoever winds up with the job. Forget that he would be directly succeeding a legend, one of college football’s greatest icons. Forget that he’d be taking over less than two months before signing day. The new coach will take over a program that will be scrutinized like no college football program has been scrutinized before. And he might (and should) have just as many questions about the environment he’s walking into as athletic director David Joyner and members of his appointed search committee might have for him.
The candidate who would likely have the fewest of those kind of questions would be the man who already has an office in the Lasch Building. Tom Bradley presents Joyner with an interesting choice. If he gives the longtime assistant a shot, he eases Penn State’s transition through what could be some of the most challenging months or years in the program’s history. If he chooses a coach from outside the program, he might sacrifice a few recruits (more if assistants Larry Johnson and Ron Vanderlinden leave as well) but would have as close to a clean break from the Paterno era as Penn State is likely to get.
For some, that would mean a break from the Nittany Lions’ gentle descent from the ranks of the elite, a time during which Penn State won many games but few against top opponents. Bradley was a part of those wins but also a part of those frustrating losses. The same fans who wanted to see Paterno, however much they loved him, step aside and let someone else take the reins are likely to want to see his chief assistant turn over those reins, even if they’ve only been in his hands for a few weeks.
The other important thing to remember is the successor’s salary. For years, Penn State employed Paterno at an absolute bargain price. Comments by then-president Graham Spanier that the university would not get into an "arms race" when it came time to bring in a new coach made some fear that Penn State would be handicapped by salary constraints.
Well, Spanier is gone, and aiding Joyner in the search is Ira Lubert, an alumnus and former trustee who is not only wealthy enough to use his own clout to help his alma mater bag a qualified candidate but has already shown the willingness to do so (see Sanderson, Cael).
Paterno’s successor will likely be paid like one of the nation’s elite coaches. Joyner, Lubert and the rest of the Penn State community will hope he also produces like one.
Right now, though, it’s hard to see many elite coaches out there for the taking.
Jeff Rice covers Penn State football for the Centre Daily Times. He can be reached at 231-4609 or jrice@centredaily.com or follow him on Twitter @psu_football
