Matt Campbell’s first six games at Penn State have already produced a familiar kind of disappointment. The Nittany Lions sit at 3-3 overall and 0-3 in Big Ten play after Saturday night’s 31-23 loss to USC, a game played before the largest crowd in Beaver Stadium history.
Afterward, Campbell opened by addressing the fan base, then settled into the kind of postgame language coaches lean on when the results aren’t there yet. “I think my disappointment is that we can’t give them the result that they deserve. But the reality is we will, and we will find a pathway forward.”
That was quickly followed by another line that will ring familiar to Penn State supporters only six games into the Campbell era: “We do have great humans in that locker room that stand for what’s right, and there was growth forward. We’re not where we need to be yet, but we are growing forward, and we’ll demand a pathway forward.”
The phrase “stand for what’s right” lands hard because it sounds like the kind of old-school college football thinking that no longer matches the sport’s current reality. In the NIL and revenue-sharing era, the very forces some coaches are still treating like a threat are the ones shaping how championship teams get built.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with using the transfer portal. Campbell did exactly that this offseason, bringing in much of his roster from Iowa State.
And there’s nothing wrong with players making millions in a sport that has generated billions for years off their labor. If college football is finally giving players a share and more leverage after lawsuits knocked down the NCAA’s amateurism rules, that’s not the system breaking down.
That’s the labor force getting a piece of what it helped create.
Players choosing to stay in school and earn degrees has value, sure. But if a player sees a better financial opportunity elsewhere, it’s hard to call that “wrong” with a straight face.
That’s the market. That’s the modern game.
The deeper concern for Penn State is whether Campbell is still operating with an old playbook while the sport has already moved on. Coaches who keep talking about doing things “the right way” or building “the right way” are often talking about the old way, whether they mean to or not. And that approach is getting left behind.
That doesn’t mean Penn State’s rough start is entirely about Campbell’s philosophy. He was hired after the early signing period, and the timing left him heavily dependent on his former Iowa State players to piece together the roster. But if he doesn’t use this offseason to lean harder into the portal and remake the team, the program could be staring at a longer rebuild than anyone wanted.
And in a sport where Curt Cignetti turned Indiana into a 16-0 national champion in Year 2 and Bob Chesney has UCLA humming in Year 1, waiting too long to adapt can be the difference between catching up and falling behind for good.
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Indiana, though, gives Ohio State little margin for error. Day pointed to the Hoosiers recent success and made clear they are not the kind of opponent to take lightly, especially with lineup questions still hanging over his own side. The Buckeyes should be closer to full strength, but this matchup still comes with one obvious layer of uncertainty: exactly how quickly those returning starters can settle back in and how much of the rotation changes with them. [Read more 🡒]