Blue White Illustrated

F O O T B A L L Charlie Fisher returns to his native central Pennsylvania to take charge of Penn State's passing game NO PLACE LIKE HOME T here's a poster of Beaver Stadium leaning against a wall in Charlie Fish- er's new office at the Lasch Building, waiting to be hung. It's an aeri- al shot of the stadium at night, packed to capacity, its floodlights aglit- ter, its upper decks teeming with fans. The Beaver Stadium depicted in that image is a far cry from the one that Fisher used to visit in the late 1960s and early '70s, when his older broth- er was enrolled at Penn State and his family was attending games. "There were wooden bleachers back then," Fisher said. "That tells you how far back that goes. I can remember seeing Ted Kwalick and Dennis Onkotz and Jack Ham. One of my most vivid memories is of getting Gary Hayman's wrist- band. Gary Hayman wouldn't remember that, but I sure do. I was probably about 10 or 11 years old. It was after a game, and I thought that was the coolest thing in the world." Fisher was born and raised in Allenwood, Pa., a small com- munity located along the Susquehanna River, about 60 miles east of State College. His father worked at the federal prison there and did some farming, too. His brother graduated from Penn State in 1974. Charlie graduated from Warrior Run High School in '77, and then headed off to Springfield Col- lege in Massachusetts. He went on to enjoy a successful coaching career, with stops at Eastern Kentucky, Ole Miss, West Georgia, North Carolina State, Temple, Vanderbilt and Miami of Ohio. Along the way, he coached a num- ber of players who went on to make a big impact in the NFL: Torry Holt, Koren Robinson and Jay Cutler. And now he's returned home. In February, Bill O'Brien announced that Penn State had made Fisher the final member of its new coaching staff. He'll be working with the quarterbacks, a group that this year will include re- turnees Matt McGloin, Rob Bolden and Paul Jones, as well as walk-on Shane McGregor and incoming freshman Steven Bench. As of this writing, the Nit- tany Lions were also said to be under consideration by Danny O'Brien, a Freshman All-American at Maryland who didn't fit into Randy Edsall's of- fense and is looking to transfer. If watching games in Beaver Stadium was the coolest thing in the world to an 11-year-old kid, returning as a coach is right up there, too. Fisher's family ties to central Pennsylvania run deep. "My wife is from here. She went to Warrior Run High School," he said. "She's my high school sweetheart. Her family's all here, so this is home. When I had an opportunity to come back here and coach at Penn State, I can't tell you the excitement for all of us – my family, my mom. So this is a special time for me in my coaching career." Fisher recently took the time to speak to BWI's Matt Herb about Penn State's quarterback position. Here, edited for length, is what he had to say… W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M So how did the opportunity to coach at Penn State arise? Well, I had a connection to Coach O'Brien through Coach [Ted] Roof and Glenn Spencer, who's a very, very close friend of mine – co-defen- sive coordinator at Oklahoma State. They were helping me get my name in front of Coach O'Brien, and he did some research and the timing just worked out perfectly. I was able to get in front of him and secure the job. It's a true blessing for me. I've been very grateful, very humbled by the opportunity. Because in the coaching profession, you don't get a lot of opportunities to coach at a place you've dreamed of coaching all your life. For me, this is a special opportunity at a special university. Just an awesome football program that's got great tradition. I know that from growing up here. That's the deal. On Saturdays in the fall, everyone heads here. It's been a neat first month here, and I'm really excited as we move forward with the program. What was your connection to Ted Roof? Ted was the coach at West Georgia ahead of me. Ted and Mac McWhorter both spent time at West Georgia just ahead of me. Ted and Glenn were teammates and college roommates, so I got to know Ted through him. I've coached against Ted. When he was at Duke, I was at Vanderbilt, so I've known him and [Penn State tight ends coach] John Strollo, who was at Springfield when I was a player. He was a graduate assistant at Springfield when I was playing in the fall of '80. So I've got some connection to the guys on the staff. What is your vision for the quar- terback position going forward? We want to get to the point where we're consistently putting out quar- terbacks who are playing at a high level each and every year. When I came here and Coach O'Brien and I talked, we felt like we can recruit elite quarterbacks here. Not to say they haven't had great quarterbacks here before, because they have. I think the big thing is that we have to consistently put out a high-level player who is going to be consistent, each and every Saturday, and be a tremendous leader for us, be a good decision-maker, be accurate with the football, protect the football and be able to make plays. You've got to be able to make plays at the posi- tion. As that guy goes, generally your team goes and certainly your offense. So that's certainly our vi- sion. We're excited to see this group. We have intentionally not tried to over- do watching tape of these guys. This is a new system, and it's going to be very interesting to see who grasps it mentally and who's able to run it. Every offense has its nuances, and this is obviously going to be differ- ent from others. So we're excited to see how this group of players does, because the players who we have here now are the ones we're going to play with. We've got Steven Bench coming in, but these guys who go through spring ball will have a leg up from learning the offense. So we've got to ID a quarterback out of this group who's going to be our guy. What are some of the challenges going to be for those guys? There's going to be some new ter- minology… Well, that's it. Football is football in a sense. Coordinators may have a tweak on a play or they may like this play better than that one, but by and large, the game has its core set of plays that you run and the A P R I L 1 1 , 2 0 1 2 25

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