Two More Candidates Emerge in the Tennessee Head Football Coaching Search

Penn State head coach James Franklin? Iowa State’s Matt Campbell? One is wishful thinking, but the other is intriguing.

Marky Billson

Today’s episode of As the Tennessee Coaching Carousel Turns we learn that Minnesota head coach P.J. Fleck is reportedly not interested in the Tennessee head coaching position as two new, intriguing candidates emerge.

They are Penn State head coach James Franklin and Iowa State head coach Matt Campbell.

Franklin is the sexier candidate of the two. What would it mean for Tennessee football if, at the program’s nadir, they could pluck away Penn State’s head coach?

What would it mean to get a native Pennsylvanian away from Penn State?

Prior to the 2016 Pitt-Penn State game, perhaps the lowest point of Franklin’s career, Johnny Majors told me personally he felt Franklin was a good coach.

It would mean is Franklin, after a 4–5 season with the Nittany Lions, is on the hot seat, which is something a Penn State head coach has never really been on.

It would also mean he expects the Nittany Lions to be awful next season, just as he knew he was leaving the Vanderbilt cupboard bare when he departed to State College.