There’s a certain poetry to a defensive lineman calling offensive plays. It’s like a chess player who used to be a boxer-he knows what the other side is trying to do because he’s been in the trenches himself.
That’s exactly the case with Taylor Mouser, Penn State’s new offensive coordinator. And if that sounds familiar, it should.
Head coach Matt Campbell took a similar path: dominant defensive end turned offensive mind. Now, the two are reunited in State College after a decade-long run together at Iowa State.
Mouser’s journey from the defensive line at Division II Adams State to calling plays in the Big Ten is anything but conventional-but it’s also part of what makes him such an intriguing figure in the Nittany Lions’ new offensive brain trust. Back in his playing days, Mouser was a 6-foot-1, 235-pound edge rusher who racked up 11 tackles for loss and five sacks in his final season. Not exactly the typical résumé for a guy now coaching tight ends and dialing up passing concepts.
But that defensive background? It’s not a weakness-it’s a weapon.
“I think it helps when you have a head coach that played defensive end, also, that’s an offensive guy,” Mouser said last week. “Coach Campbell played defensive line and then got into offense, and you can kind of go into it with a blank slate.”
That blank slate has turned into a pretty impressive canvas. Mouser started as a grad assistant at Toledo in 2015, working under Campbell.
Since then, he’s worn a lot of hats: scouting assistant, senior quality control coach, tight ends coach, and eventually offensive coordinator at Iowa State. And now, at Penn State, he’s not just calling plays-he’s also coaching the tight ends.
It’s a full-circle moment, especially when you consider how his coaching career started. When Mouser first arrived at Toledo, Campbell asked him a simple but telling question: What position do you know the least about?
Mouser’s answer? Wide receiver.
“So, (Campbell) put me with the receivers,” Mouser recalled. “It was great for me.
I was hungry to learn. I worked with a great guy, Derek Sage, who’s the Washington State receivers coach right now.
And I went in there and did everything that he asked.”
That hunger to learn, to fill in the gaps, became a defining trait. Mouser knew he had to earn the trust of the players in a room he never played in.
That meant film study-a lot of it. It meant breaking things down in a way that made sense to the players.
And it meant proving, every day, that he belonged.
Fast forward to 2024, and Mouser’s offense at Iowa State wasn’t just competent-it was explosive. The Cyclones won 11 games that season, powered by quarterback Rocco Becht’s 3,505 passing yards and 25 touchdowns.
Wideouts Jaylin Noel and Jayden Higgins each cracked the 1,000-yard mark. The team averaged 31.1 points per game and capped the season with a wild 42-41 win over Miami in the Pop-Tarts Bowl.
That kind of production doesn’t happen by accident. It’s the result of a coordinator who understands both sides of the ball-and knows how to exploit what defenses are trying to do.
“I think when you watch the success we’ve been able to have offensively over the last two years, especially with the type of teams we had at Iowa State, I think no matter who we played, where we played ... we really gave ourselves a great opportunity to have great success offensively,” Campbell said last week.
He didn’t stop there.
“I think Taylor has proven over his two-year period to be one of the up-and-coming bright minds in all of college football,” Campbell added. “I think he’s got a fearlessness as a play-caller.”
That fearlessness doesn’t mean recklessness. Mouser knows there are going to be days when the defense has to carry the load, and the offense’s job is to play smart, complementary football. But there are also days-like that Pop-Tarts Bowl showdown-when the offense has to win a shootout.
“There’s going to be a time where we’re going to have to win the game 9-7 and we’re going to have to play to the defense,” Mouser said. “And there’s going to be times where you’ve got to go win and you’ve got to win (42-41).”
The key? Making the right call in the moment.
Trusting your preparation. And never losing sight of the bigger picture.
That’s the version of Taylor Mouser Penn State is getting: a coach who’s walked in the shoes of the guys trying to stop his offense. A teacher who’s earned his stripes in every room he’s entered. And a play-caller who’s not afraid to swing big when the moment demands it.
With Campbell and Mouser leading the charge, Penn State’s offense is in the hands of two former defensive linemen who know exactly how to attack a defense-because they used to be the ones doing the attacking.